Joseon Korea

A Korean dynasty that lasted five centuries and kept a record of itself more complete than almost any other pre-modern state. Yi Seong-gye founded Joseon in 1392 and it governed until 1897, adopting Neo-Confucianism as the organising principle of law, family and administration, and recruiting officials by examination. Sejong the Great commissioned hangul in 1443, an alphabet designed from scratch on phonological principles so that ordinary people could become literate - the scholarly class resisted it precisely because it worked. The Veritable Records of the Joseon Dynasty run to nearly two thousand volumes compiled over the whole period, and no king was permitted to read the account of his own reign. Hideyoshi's Japanese invasions in the 1590s were fought off partly by Admiral Yi Sun-sin, whose turtle ships won a series of naval actions including Myeongnyang, where thirteen ships held off a far larger fleet. Manchu invasions followed. The dynasty then restricted foreign contact so thoroughly it was called the hermit kingdom. Japan forced it open in 1876 and annexed Korea in 1910. Confucian academies and royal tombs are World Heritage sites. Hanseong, now Seoul, was the capital throughout. The dynasty ran from 1392 to 1897, when it was renamed the Korean Empire. Its rain gauges, installed from 1441, produced one of the longest continuous weather records anywhere. Jikji, printed with movable metal type in 1377, predates Gutenberg by decades. The Veritable Records are a World Heritage documentary listing and were kept in multiple copies at separate mountain archives against fire and war.

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