Gwanggaeto Stele

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And in the sinmyo year (辛卯年) the Wa (倭) came and crossed the sea (來渡海) and defeated (破) Baekje (百 殘), [unknown], and [Sil]la (新羅) and made them (以爲) subjects (臣民)

They presumed that Wa referred to a centralized Japanese government at the time that controlled the entire western part of Japan.

In the 1910s and 20s, Torii Ryūzō and other Japanese scholars traveled to Ji'an and observed the stele close hand. They found that the inscription had been repaired by clay and lime, and therefore questioned the credibility of the rubbed copy. [32]

The first Korean scholarly study challenging the Japanese interpretation was published by Chŏng In-bo  [ ko ] in 1955. He supposed that the subjects of the sentence 渡海破 and 以爲臣民 were respectively Goguryeo and Baekje. By Chŏng's interpretation the entire passage read as follows:

And in the sinmyo year Wa [invaded Goguryeo], [and Goguryeo also] came and crossed the sea and defeated [Wa]. Then Baekje [allied with Wa] and subjugated [Sil]la [33] [34]

In 1959 the Japanese scholar Teijiro Mizutani published another important study. [35] He had acquired rubbed copies made before the repair of the stele and concluded that Sakō's copy had not been made by the rubbing method but rather had been traced, a method known in China as shuanggou tianmo (双鉤塡墨).

The North Korean scholar Kim reported his conclusions in a 1963 article. [36] He had studied the Japanese chronicles Kojiki and Nihonshoki , and concluded that Wa referred to colonies of Samhan in Japan. He claimed that these colonies were established by Korean immigrants and was centered in Kyūshū, Kinai, Izumo. Later, according to Kim, the colonies were absorbed by Yamato polity, which was also founded by Koreans. He also posited that the subject of 來渡海破百殘 was Goguryeo, and 百殘 was not the Baekje kingdom but Baekje's colony in Japan. Other North Korean scholar also argued for Goguryeo's invasion of Japan. [37]

Many Korean scholars reject the interpretation that Japan (倭) conquered (破) Baekje and Silla. It is difficult to tell when sentences begin or end because of the absence of punctuation and the necessity of reading into the text via context. [38] Furthermore, the subjects Baekje and Silla are not recognizably mentioned in the passage; only the first character for "Baekje" (百) is noted, and even the supposed first character of Silla is not complete (only 斤 as opposed to 新). Furthermore, the character "jan" (殘) was a character used derogatively by Goguryeo in place of the character "jae" (濟) in Baekje's official name (this may have denoted wishful thinking on the part of Goguryeo that another nation came and conquered Baekje). Thus, when taking into consideration the major absence of characters and lack of punctuation, the passage reads:

And in the sinmyo year the Wa (Japanese) crossed the sea. (Abbreviation of someone's title) made (?) subjects of (?)

However, further analysis of the passage is that Goguryeo, not Japan, crossed the sea and defeated Baekje or Wa.

In the case of this interpretation, and the abbreviation of King Gwanggaeto's title in the passage, the passage states:

And in the sinmyo year the Wa crossed the sea. King Gwanggaeto (abbreviation) made Silla and Baekje subjects of (?)

Some point out several facts that put in doubt the traditional Japanese interpretation of the sinmyo passage. Firstly, the term Wa at the time the stele was made did not solely refer to people from Japan but could also refer to the people from southern Korean, particularly from the Gaya Confederacy. [39] [40]

Conspiracy theories

In 1972 the Zainichi Korean scholar Lee Jin-hui (Yi Jin-hui; romaji: Ri Jinhi) reported the most controversial theory of the interpretation. He claimed the stele had been intentionally damaged by the Japanese Army in the 20th century to justify the Japanese invasion of Korea. According to his books, Sakō altered the copy and later the Japanese General Staff thrice sent a team to make the falsification of the stele with lime. [41] [42] In 1981, the Korean Lee Hyung-gu began putting forth the argument, based on the irregularity of the Chinese character style and grammar, that the sinmyo passage was altered so as 後 read 倭, and 不貢因破 read 來渡海破. Thus, the subject of the sinmyo passage becomes Goguryeo. [43] Geng Tie-Hua questioned another character, claiming 毎 was altered to 海. [44]

Chinese scholars participated in studies of the stele from the 1980s. Wang Jianqun interviewed local farmers and decided the intentional fabrication had not occurred and the lime was pasted by local copy-making workers to enhance readability. He criticized Lee Jin-hui's claim. He considered 倭 ("Wa") word meaning is not a country but a pirate group, and he also denied Japan dominated the southern part of Korea. [45] [46] Xu Jianxin of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences discovered the earliest rubbed copy which was made before 1881. He also concluded that there was no evidence the Japanese had damaged any of the stele characters. [32]

Today, most Chinese scholars deny the conspiracy theory proposed by Lee Jin-hui in light of the newly discovered rubbed copy. [32] [47] [48]

In the project of writing a common history textbook, Kim Tae-sik of Hongik University (Korea) [49] denied Japan's theory. But, Kōsaku Hamada  [ ja ] of Kyushu University (Japan) [50] reported his interpretation of the Gwanggaeto Stele text, neither of them adopting Lee's theory in their interpretations.

Relations to other chronicles and archaeological records

In refuting the interpretation that Wa conquered Baekje and Silla, some Korean scholars alleges that it is unreasonable that a monument honoring the triumphs of a Goguryeo king singles out a Japanese ("Wa") victory as worthy of mention on the stele (if one follows the Japanese interpretation). [38]

Generally, Japanese scholars points out that the rhetoric of inscription describes Gwanggaeto's battle as "overcoming the trying situation". Yukio Takeda claims that "Wa's invasion" was used as such situation when describing battles against Baekje. Some Japanese scholars also propose that Wa's power was more or less exaggerated by Goguryeo to illustrate the triumph of the King, and the sinmyo passage does not necessarily prove the power of Wa in Korean peninsula of the late 4th century.

On the other hand, they generally reject the Korean interpretation because the stele says Baekje was previously a state subservient to Goguryeo before the sinmyo passage and that recording the conquest into Baekje would result tautology in this section of the stele. Therefore, the statement in the stele that claims Baekje was a Goguryeo subject before the sinmyo passage would be propaganda on the part of Goguryeo; thus the conquest of Baekje would not be redundant.

Further, Japanese arbitrarily assert the Korean interpretation which claim Goguryeo as the subject that conquered Baekje and Silla as an inconsistency with the preceding phrase "crossed the sea." But, it is probable that the phrase indicate Battle in Gwanmi, a maritime fortress of Baekje until 391.

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ 懐仁; Wade-Giles: "Huai-jen"
  2. ↑ Guan served the magistrate of Huairen County (李進熙 1973, p. 56, citing Ikeuchi Hiroshi (池内宏)'s Ji'an's County History)
  3. ↑ Guan Yueshan made rubbings of one letter per sheet.
  4. ↑ The ink-rubbing artisan ordered by the magistrate to burn off the vegetation encrusting the monument was interviewed by Imanishi Ryū  [ ja ] who stated with conviction this happened in 1882. Guan Yuenshan's superior named Zhang 章樾 was still magistrate of Huairen County until January 1882, but Yi Jin-hui conjectured a different governor named Chen 陳士芸 was responsible.
  5. ↑ Yi also notes the lack of sturdy large paper and skilled stone-rubbing technicians.
  6. ↑ Tracings, i.e., shuanggou ben (双鉤本; "double-contour version") in Chinese and sōkōbon in Japanese ((Hatada 1979, p. 3), (李進熙 1973, pp. 68–9)) The full name of the technique is shuanggou tianmo (双鉤塡墨 "double-tracing and ink-filling")
  7. 1 2 The full text in classical Chinese is available at the Chinese wikisource)
  8. ↑ "Northern Puyo"
  9. ↑ In the inscriptions, Baekje (or Paekche 百済) are referred to as Baekjan (or Paekchan 百殘) Lee & De Bary 1997, p. 25.
  10. ↑ This year was ulmi (乙未) in the Sexagenary cycle, the nexus between the "year of ul (wood-yin)" × the "year of the sheep"
  11. ↑ Korean : 패려; Hanja : 稗麗; MR : P'aeryŏ. "Paeryeo" is also transliterated "Piryŏ" (Lee & De Bary 1997, p. 25) "Piryo" (Hirano 1977, p. 72) and "Pili" (Hatada 1979, p. 2)
  12. ↑ "the King crossed the Ari River"
  13. ↑ Daebang
  14. ↑ Baekche or Hou-yen from Liaodong Peninsula have been conjectured (Hatada 1979, p. 2), and some scholars postulate Pyongyang to have been the battle zone.
  15. ↑ Also transliterated "Tung-fu-yü" Chinese style
  16. ↑ sinmyo 辛卯 in the Sexagenary cycle is nexus of the "year of sin (metal-yin)" × the "Year of the rabbit"

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References

  1. ↑ 이창우, 그림; 이희근, 글 : 최승필,감수 (15 July 2010). 세상이 깜짝 놀란 우리 역사 진기록 (in Korean). 뜨인돌출판. ISBN   9788958074731 . Retrieved 11 October 2016.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
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  16. 1 2 Hatada (1979), p. 3.
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  26. 1 2 Hatada (1979), p. 2.
  27. ↑ Kim, Djun (2014). The History of Korea, 2nd Edition. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO. p. 32. ISBN   9781610695817.
  28. ↑ Lee & De Bary (1997), p. 24–25.
  29. 1 2 Lee & De Bary (1997), p. 25.
  30. 1 2 Kane (2002), p. 64.
  31. ↑ Kirkland (1981), p. 124.
  32. 1 2 3 4 Xu, Jianxin. 好太王碑拓本の研究 (An Investigation of Rubbings from the Stele of Haotai Wang). Tokyodo Shuppan, 2006. ISBN   978-4-490-20569-5.
  33. ↑ 鄭寅普, 庸斎白楽濬博士還甲記念国学論叢, 1995
  34. ↑ Kane (2002), p. 66.
  35. ↑ 好太王碑考, 書品,　vol.100, 1959
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  37. ↑ 広開土王陵碑, 朝鮮社会科学院出版社, 1966
  38. 1 2 Lee, Kenneth B. (1997). Korea and East Asia: The Story of a Phoenix. Greenwood Publishing Group. pp.  33. ISBN   0-275-95823-X. OCLC   35637112.
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  40. ↑ Lewis, James B.; Amadu Sesay (2002). Korea and Globalization: Politics, Economics and Culture. Routledge. pp.  104. ISBN   0-7007-1512-6. OCLC   46908525.
  41. ↑ 李進熙 (1972), 広開土王陵碑の研究[Study of Kōkaidoō monument], Yoshikawa Kodokan 吉川弘文館
  42. ↑ ( 李進熙 1973 , Ch. 5, pp. 137–)
  43. ↑ 李享求, 広開土王陵碑新研究, 同和出版社, 1986
  44. ↑ 耿鉄華　好太王碑<辛卯年>句考釈, 考古と文物, 1992
  45. ↑ 好太王碑研究, 王健群, 1984, 吉林人民
  46. ↑ EnCyber encyclopedia Archived 15 November 2007 at the Wayback Machine
    1984년에는 중국의 왕젠췬[王建群]이 장기간의 실지조사를 토대로 『호태왕비연구(好太王碑硏究)』를 발표했는데, 그는 이제까지 잘못 읽은 부분은 시정하고 탈락된 문자를 복원했다고 주장하고, 비문의 총 글자를 1,775자로 확정했다. 그리고 비문에 등장하는 왜(倭)를 일본 기타큐슈[北九州]의 해적집단으로 보아 임나일본부설을 부정했을 뿐만 아니라 이진희의 석회조작설도 비판했다.
  47. ↑ Takeda, Yukio (1989). "Studies on the King Gwanggaeto Inscription and Their Basis". Memoirs of the Research Department of the Toyo Bunko. 47: 57–87.
  48. ↑ Oh, Byung-sang, "FOUNTAIN: Echoes of drumming hoofbeats", JoongAng Ilbo, 4 October 2002.
  49. ↑ Kim, Tae-Sik. Korean-Japanese Relationships in 4th Century; based on Wa Troops Issues in Gwanggaeto Stele. The Japan-Korea Cultural Foundation. 2005. "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 30 October 2008. Retrieved 26 August 2008.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  50. ↑ Hamada, Kosaku. "Japanese-Korean Relationships in 4th Century." Archived 30 October 2008 at the Wayback Machine The Japan-Korea Cultural Foundation. 2005.

Bibliography

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Gwanggaeto Stele
Chinese name
Chinese 好太王碑