A study of Koguryo and ancient Japan   Monument to king Kwanggaeto The Great  The Significance of Koguryo History

Koguryo Kingdom(or Goguryeo, 277 B.C.-668 A.D.):

A Glorious Ancient Korean Kingdom in Northeast Asia

First Feudal Kingdoms
The slave-owning society that lasted over a stretch of several hundreds years gave way to the feudal society around the period before and after the Christian era. There appeared many feudal forces in the land of Kochoseon, Puyo and Chinguk. The biggest ones of all those forces were Koguryo, Paekje and Silla.
They absorbed the neighbouring forces and formed big kingdoms. The three kingdoms existed from the period before and after the Christian era to the 7th century.  In korean history this period is called the period of Three Kingdoms.

Inside of the ANAK TOMB No.3 (about the middle of the 4th C.)

Chongyouong or Blue Dragon		Paekho or White Tiger

Koguryo

Out of three kingdoms, Koguryo was founded first. She was the biggest and strongest. In 277 BC, the Koguryo tribe who had lived in the middle reaches of the Amnok-gang River, the land of Kochoseon, formed a feudal kingdom consisting of allied feudal forces.
The legend says that Chumong, founder of Koguryo, was born of an egg and that his father was son of the Creator and his mother was daughter of the king of dragon. He grew at the palace of the Kingdom of Puyo. As he was an expert archer and endowed with unusual talents from his very early age, he became the envy of the princes of the Kingdom of Puyo and was eventually reduced to a horse feeder at the king's palace.
Later, informed of their attempt to kill him, he fled southward riding a excellent steed he himself had prepared beforehand, and there he founded a dynasty. Of course, the legend attaching to the founder of the kingdom sounds incredible. But through this fantastic story about the creation of the kingdom we can judge that the process of founding the kingdom of Kogyryo points to close connections with that of Puyo.
The Koguryo tribe was a tribe who had separated from Puyo and lived in the middle reaches of the Amnok-gang River. This tribe who had made rapid progress, inheriting the productive forces and culture of Kochoseon and Puyo, entered the road of feudalization and founded Korea's first feudal kingdom. The first capital of Koguryo was Kugnaesong(now Chian in Northeast China). Big feudal forces in five areas such as yonnobu, cholnobu, sunnobu, kwannobu and kyerubu were credited with the feat of the foundation of the kingdom.
The creation of the Kingdom of Koguryo, a new feudal dynasty, markedan important landmark in beating off the Han aggressors and accelerating the collapse of slave-owning society.
The political system was based on the aristocratic democracy. The king could not exercise monopolistic control. Important national affairs and trials were handled only in accordance with the resolutions adopted at the aristocrats' council. With the expansion of the territory and the growth of national power, the ruling system was readjusted and reinforced step by step.

Gorgeous gold phoenix decorations are to be found in the artifacts of the Koguryo

The king, Kochuga royal aristocrats, taega and sanga or aristocrats and homin or upper layer of the common people belonged to the ruling classes. The ruled classes were composed of self-supporting pea-sants, the absolute majority of the population, haho or serfs and hired hands.
The land and people gained in the course of unifying the feudal forces and expending the territory came under the governorship of the state. Part of them was given out to dignitaries as their fiefs. As for the surrendering aristocrats, permission was accorded them to preserver their former authority and autonomous activity. This meat that within the state system there emerged a feudal lord system. But Koguryo was a virtually centralized ieudal kingdom. paekje and silla followed the same pattern in the state system.
After her foundation, Koguryo continued to expand her territory. This was done through the conquest of the neighbouring out han aggressors from the former land Kochoson, in 49A.D. she advance sd far as Taiyuan of north china to dear heav blows to Han. in 55 ten castles were built in the area west of the Liao River early year of the Christi era, an area covering noth and south hamgyong provinces of today came under dominition later the basin her the taedong-gang-River across the River changchon-gang was incorporated in this kingdom. Her territory had a long sretch as far as the taedong-gang River in the in the south and the east Sea in the east.
Even after that , the Koguryo people continued with their struggle as her descendants. in this course, Koguryo sometimes suffered great losses in face of surprise attacks on the part of the aggressors, but the stubborn out of the former land of Kochoson and completely recovering the area east of the liao River in the early 4th century. in the early 5th century, the territory of Koguryo was expanded greatly. in the west she gained control over the later Yen of the Hsienpei tribe and the Laiohsi region and in the south she occupied the broad area north of the han-gang River by attacking paekje. In 410 she attacked puyo and seized 64 castles and more then 1,400 villages, thereby expanding her northeas-thrn territory as far as the basin of the Ussuri River.
As seen above, Koguryo grew into a strong dy-nasty with wide territory and mighty military potential within a few centuries after her founding. the credit for this was due to the martial spirit of her people.
In the course of their arduous struggle to trans-fome nature and oppose the formidable foreign ene-mies, they came to acquire a habit of practicing arche-ry and a firm quality in life.
Military arts were encouraged in every way. in March ever year a national contest of hunting and military arts was organized and those who had dis-played extraordinary proficiency in the contest were officially commended and taken into government posts. For their daily practice in military arts, they could fight bravely in all battles against the aggres-sors. Koguryo became a strong power and demon-strated her invincible might in the East. This owed entirely to her gallant and high-spirited people who were firmly equipped military.
After she realized the recovery of her northwest-ern territory and grew into a mighty feudal dynasty, Koguryo transferred her capital to Pyongyang in 427in order to push forward the work of unifying Paeje and silla. After that she expand her territory south-ward. thus in the late 5th century, her south fron-tier reached the line linkg the Asan Bay on the West Sea and Uljin and Ullung-do island on the east sea.
The wide, fertile land and the peoples creative labour allowed the country to increase agricultural production and develop handicraft manufacturing and trade. The large-scale Anhak Palace and the Changan Castle (Pyongyang) and magnificent tombs whit mu-rals of opulent splendor, built at that time, testify to the fact that Koguryo became highly developed eco-nomically and culturally.
The might of Koguryo could be seen in her close relation with many regions of china and her influence exerted upon japan in the realms of economy and culture. Those Koguryo people who went to japan fromed a big political force there and greatly in-fluenced her in economic and cultural realms. Techni-cians of Koguryo who had visited japan imparted to japanese counterparts how to produce Koguryo silk fabrics(Koma brocabe) and how to tan leather. tam-jing, a Koguryo monk in the 7th century, enabled japanese to be given details about the manufacturing of paper and black writing flui, the construction of water mills and colour scheme.
The murals in the Takamatsuzuka tomb unearthed recently in Nara Prefecture, japen, are a striking testimonial to Koguryos political and cultural impact upon japan.
The concept thrashed out by Koguryo to unify the three Kingdoms before and after the time of the transfer of her capital to Pyongyong was quite within the bounds of possibility. from the sandpoint of his-torical development this task should have been under-taken by Koguryo because she was the strongest of the three kingdoms. This urged the rulers of Koguryo to maintain a strong national power and adopt an adamant attitude. But there occurred some change in the situation from the latter half of the 6th century.
Increasing authority and concentration of wealth in the hands of the feudal lords on the heels of territorial expansion gradually gave rise to laziness and slackness. There was a mad scramble for power. This as attended by intensified repression of the people and this resulted in weakening national power. As a result, Koguryo failed to realize unification of the three kingdoms and the dynasty itself came to an end.
In the period between the late 6th century and the early 7th century, Koguryo was subjected to re-peated large-scale invasion from sui, a feudal by-nasty which unified China, and Tang, a feudal dynasty which succeeded to Sui. At That time the patriotic people of Koguryo fought bravery, giving massive casualties to the invaders and thus defending their country with honour. But due to the losses she had suffered in the war that lasted nearly 70 years and the scramble for power within the ruling circles, Ko-guryo went to ruin in 668 in face of the attack of the allied troops of Silla and Tang.

Lifestyle of Koguryeo People   Food, Clothing and Housing Winter weather in Koguryeo was very cold. So, a warm dwelling environment was very important in their lives. Koguryeo people invented the "ondol" heating system in which a floor stone is heated by burning fire at one end of the room with the smoke traveling underneath and exiting at the other end, making the living space warm. The system was widely used in palaces, temples and military posts, as well as houses of ordinary citizens. Ondol heating that is in use at most of the contemporary Korean dwellings today originated from Koguryeo. However, in Koguryeo, only part of a large room had hot-floors heated by this method. Other furniture such as wooden tables, beds or chairs were placed in other parts of the room so that people could sleep at night or sit around for daily routines.   kitchen   meat storage Comfortable jackets and trousers for outdoor activities were the basic garments for Koguryeo men. Unlike Chinese men who wore skirts, Koguryeo men wore trousers that were favorable for horse riding like nomadic people of the northern region. They closed the front of a jacket to the left and tied the waist without buttons. This style was intended to increase efficiency and convenience when shooting arrows. Women wore a variety of skirts such as pleated, rainbow-striped or polka-dot skirts. But they also wore comfortable trousers. Often they would enjoy wearing outer robes adorned with bright patterns. Most Koguryeo men wore a topknot hairstyle and a hat. Women wore various hairstyles and sometimes used wigs. In Koguryeo, colorful clothing styles flourished as a variety of clothing materials including silk was produced thanks to its advanced dying technology.   topknot hairstyle   lady Even serfs wore colorfully patterned clothes. Generally, men preferred comfortable and practical clothes, and women liked to wear comfortable yet beautiful dresses. Koguryeo people enjoyed diverse diets. Rice, beans and millet were staple grains, while barley, wheat and Indian millet served as a subsidiary diet. Toward the latter period of the kingdom, consumption of rice increased. With regard to diet of the early period, they ate hot gruel by grinding up grains and boiling them with water in earthenware (like "grits"). They soon switched to grains steamed in an earthenware steamer, and then they learned to boil rice in a cauldron (which is the way Koreans cook rice today). The representative Koguryeo dish was "maeg-jeok, or roasted meat with seasonings. This is the predecessor of today's "bulgogi" (roast beef), one of the most famous Korean dishes. A dinner table of Koguryeo people would consist of half a dozen different foods prepared in various-sized dishes, including fine dinnerware called "judu," on a table called "joban." They ate their meals with spoons and chopsticks. They also used a small knife called "ojado" to cut meat into small pieces. They would also have cabbage, lettuce and radish preserved with salt. In later generations, people would add red peppers to the dish, and this is the origin of Korea's world famous "kimchi" (fermented vegetable dish). The home of beans, Koguryeo would use beans to make various sauces made from beans, like soybean paste and soy sauce. They also enjoyed brewing rice wines. Draw well

Festivals, Games and Lifestyle People of Koguryeo were fond of dancing and singing. Because they lived in a tense society, which had to fight wars constantly, and whose rules and laws were stringent, the citizens understandably found a relaxing pastime they needed in festive activities, such as drinking, singing and dancing. Come every October, the kingdom held various events, ceremonies and festive activities, including the Dongmaeng Festival (whose main purpose was to worship the gods of heaven and ancestors), where citizens of all levels gathered and enjoyed the event together. Unlike the memorial services of the Chinese, characterized by rigid formalities and solemn appearances (so as to stir up the fear of gods among viewers), Koguryeo's events and ceremonies (the Dongmaeng Festival, in particular) provided a forum of festivity where people mingled with one another, engaging in drinking, singing and dancing activities (in celebration of the "gods' descent to this world"). In the beginning of each year, as was the custom, many village people would join in the festive events held at riverside locations. Kings also used to come and watch citizens enjoying entertainment activities, which included 'stone-throw games,' a custom that has been handed down to the mid-20th century. Other popular pastime activities the Koguryeo people enjoyed included games like "baduk" ("go"), "jang-gi" (Chinese chess), "chukguk" (soccer), dice-play, "yut-nori" (the four-stick game), "tuho" (throwing-arrows-in-jar), ssireum ("sumo") and a bare-hand duel called "subak(수박)." Subak eventually evolved into Taekwondo, Korea's most well known martial art, as the sport passed through the Koryeo and Joseon Kingdoms. Ssireum(씨름), which has become a very popular sport today, is a game of wrestling in which two players compete to wrestle the other to the ground using cloth-sashes, which are tied around the waists and thighs of the players. People also enjoyed circuses brought from Central Asia, listening to musical performances, or playing musical instruments like the six-string Korean zither or flute. Hunting Hunting was also an important pastime. Interested individuals would form large-scale hunting squads, and run up and down mountains and across open fields. They would set up shooting targets and hold archery-shooting contests. Those with outstanding archery skills were named "Jumong," the nickname of King Chumo who founded the kingdom, a tag of honor. Meanwhile, young people would take academic as well as archery lessons at "gyeongdang," an educational institution, receiving a balanced training that eventually paved the way for the kingdom to foster strong military power. In terms of marriage customs, the kingdom had a practice called "seo-ok-je," in which the bride's family would build an annex ("Seo-ok') to their house and have the new couple live there and rear children until they fully grew up. This custom would disappear toward the late period of the kingdom, when it was replaced by a more liberal concept of marriage, allowing young ones in love to marry without undue delays.     The procession of the deceased   Oxcart driver Funerals also carried particular significance. Large-scale funerals were favored and hefty sums of money were paid for them. The objects that the deceased had used during his/her lifetime were buried together with the dead. Oxcart used by the spouse of deceased TOKHUNG-RI MURAL TOMB (409 A.D.) This custom was modified during the late period of the kingdom, when the belongings of the dead were placed at the side of the grave, so that funeral guests could take them. The koguryeo people would deeply mourn with sorrow and tears at the loss of their loved ones; but as was the custom at the funerals, they would 'send off' the deceased with dances, songs and music.   Fairies on a dragon and on phoenix   Chujak or Red Phoenix