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Your Book Review: Zuozhuan

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Korea was also very stable but very dysfunctional. They had this weird, subordinate relationship with China, changing their allegiance as new dynasties and invaders took control. There was this extremely ritualized trade mission that would go to give gifts to the Emperor and get gifts in return. Otherwise there was very little foreign interaction, China and Korea had agreed to prevent any settling near the border.

At home, Korea was run by actual civilian governors, to the point where they could actually have military coups in the 11th or 12th century when everyone else was feudal. One of the bureaucrats was so disrespectful to a general that, allegedly, he set his beard on fire. This caused an attempted coup. And of course, there's the one thing people know about pre-modern Korean history - fending off the Japanese with turtle-ships and heroic generalship. The saviour of Korea, Yi Sun-sin, was incredibly poorly treated. He was tortured and imprisoned twice by the government, who were legendarily corrupt and incompetent. And of course China flooded the peninsula with so many troops that the Japanese army was ground down.

By the late 19th century, Korea was still sending letters to China asking them to fix all their problems with uppity foreigners. Little had changed in centuries. A very strange place, with a very strange history. It seems only natural that today it's still a land of extremes.

They had this weird, subordinate relationship with China, changing their allegiance as new dynasties and invaders took control.

Probably worthwhile to note that this is true mostly of the Joseon period, and less true as you go back from that point, fromTang intervention on behalf of Silla in the Korean Three Kingdoms period + the Silla-Tang war; all the way to Han conquests of parts of the Korean peninsula.

At home, Korea was run by actual civilian governors, to the point where they could actually have military coups in the 11th or 12th century when everyone else was feudal.

China certainly wasn't more feudal than Korea at this point in time (especially 11-12th century), I don't think. There's a good argument that feudalism proper ended in China with the Qin dynasty (221 BC).

And of course China flooded the peninsula with so many troops that the Japanese army was ground down.

IIRC ~150k soldiers were sent during each invasion wave from Japan. Ming China sent something like 50k soldiers each time. The Ming-Joseon side were quite outnumbered when it came down to soldiers (numbers may even out more if you count Korean militia).

There were actual Ming advantages, such as much superior cannon and field artillery. I don't think "flooding the peninsula with so many troops the Japanese were ground down" really is accurate.

Good points. I remember reading somewhere that it was Ming manpower that won but that doesn't seem to match the facts as far as I can see.

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