A History of Korea (45 page)

The 1541 inheritance testament, however—drafted nearly thirty years, as it turned out, before Lady Yi’s death—provided no special consideration for Sin Saimdang. In accordance with a long-held custom, Lady Yi’s substantial estate of 173 slaves was divided more or less equally among her five daughters, with the inheritances ranging from twenty nine to thirty five slaves each. The document meticulously notes the name, age, gender, family relationship, and current residence of each of the slaves, who were scattered throughout the country except for the northwest and southeast regions. While this shows a continuation of native inheritance practices that divided estates equally among children regardless of gender or order, the Confucian demands made their presence felt in the special designation of the “ritual heir,” the descendant responsible for leading the ancestral rites. The extant inheritance documents from the early Chos
n show a gradually increasing appearance of this provision until it became standard practice by the late sixteenth century. Here the Yi family will is especially instructive, for, in the absence of any sons, the person designated to lead the ancestral ceremonies was none other than a five-year-old grandson, Yulgok, who was given land and five slaves to provide the financial wherewithal to sustain this task indefinitely. One presumes that, had Lady Yi died soon after this document was drafted, either this boy’s father or an uncle would have temporarily taken responsibility, but this provision is still notable on two levels: first, that it was the third son of the second daughter who was chosen, suggesting that this boy, Yulgok—who later, as a thirteen-year-old, would pass the introductory level state
civil service examination, in first place (!)—was already demonstrating his precociousness; and second, that no daughter, despite receiving a substantial inheritance, could be deemed fit to lead the sacrificial rites, suggesting strongly that some legal and, by now, customary restrictions on females were taking hold.

In the late Chos
n dynasty, this trend would become even more restrictive, with far greater social consequences. By the eighteenth century, the increasing centrality of the ancestor rites in the Confucian lineage system standardized the practice of primogeniture, or preference for the oldest son, not only in selecting a ritual heir, but, due to the cost of such a responsibility, in inheritance practices as well. Daughters and even younger sons received far less, if anything, and when it came to the children of concubines, the exclusion was complete. Indeed, when families in the late Chos
n era encountered a similar situation as that of Lady Yi in 1541—that is, lacking a (non-concubine’s) son—the prevailing practice was to adopt a nephew, however distant, from the same lineage, to act as both the ritual and family heir. Customs like primogeniture that later developed out of the Confucian family system hence eventually weakened the standing of women in many ways. They left women mostly with few possessions and hence little economic independence, in stark contrast to Lady Yi. They diminished women’s ritual and lineage roles. And they stigmatized the descendants of secondary wives, whose status as concubines reinforced the centrality of sexual exploitation in the social hierarchy.

It is no wonder, then, that contemporary women in South Korea look back on the early Chos
n with deep regret about what might have been—that is, without the incorporation of Confucian family practices. In modern terms, as noted above, the Yi family inheritance document and other evidence suggest strongly that pre-Chos
n Korea was relatively “advanced” in the social and familial standing of females. Without Confucianization, so the thinking goes, the country might have taken a more enlightened historical path. The sixteenth century, more specifically, is fascinating in this regard, for it could have represented the last gasp of relatively high female standing before the momentum of state instructions would overwhelm it. At the court, for example, for two decades in the
early sixteenth century, practical power was wielded substantially by two women: the first was the mother of a young king who acted as his regent, and the second was her niece, who had begun her life as a slave and ascended to a position in the court that allowed her to push for greater social opportunity for the lower classes. And in literary circles, two other women, H
Nans
rh
n and Hwang Chini, appeared far more accomplished than even Sin Saimdang.

Given this, one could suggest that Lady Sin might not have been the Bank of Korea’s best choice even from her own historical period. In any case, one can understand the disappointment expressed by women’s organizations over the selection of Lady Sin, long celebrated for her supposed dedication to Confucian family values in her role as a daughter, wife, and mother. Critics of this choice suggested that Lady Sin’s claim to fame was based not on her artistic talents, however admirable they might have been, but rather on the fact that she raised a celebrated scholar and statesman who, along with his admirers, placed Lady Sin on an undeserved pedestal. Lady Sin, in other words, was seen as a paragon of traditional (male) Confucian—not modern—virtue, and hence her selection was considered somewhat patronizing. Tellingly, before the selection South Korean women’s organizations and feminist groups had put forward another female, Yu Kwansun, as their preferred candidate for the new currency. As a cultivated teenage girl armed with modern schooling, Yu had been martyred while rallying her home town’s residents to participate in the independence movement of 1919 against Japanese colonial rule. Within the overarching, persistent framework of nationalism and modernity, then, Sin Saimdang serves as another symbolic object of contestation over the place of tradition, especially the Confucian heritage, in contemporary Korean identity. But all four historical figures, including Sin Saimdang, who are now celebrated on the South Korean bills hail from the first two centuries of the Chos
n dynasty. This suggests strongly, then, that the early Chos
n era continues to hold a commanding significance in Korean history.