Pyŏn Hyomun (1396–?) was a

Korea Korea is a peninsular region in East Asia consisting of the Korean Peninsula, Jeju Island, and smaller islands. Since the end of World War II in 1945, it has been politically Division of Korea, divided at or near the 38th parallel north, 3 ...

n civil minister (''munsin'') from the Chogye Pyŏn clan during the early period of Korean

Joseon Dynasty Joseon ( ; ; also romanized as ''Chosun''), officially Great Joseon (), was a dynastic kingdom of Korea that existed for 505 years. It was founded by Taejo of Joseon in July 1392 and replaced by the Korean Empire in October 1897. The kingdom w ...

. He briefly served as a

diplomat A diplomat (from ; romanization, romanized ''diploma'') is a person appointed by a state (polity), state, International organization, intergovernmental, or Non-governmental organization, nongovernmental institution to conduct diplomacy with one ...

and an

ambassador An ambassador is an official envoy, especially a high-ranking diplomat who represents a state and is usually accredited to another sovereign state or to an international organization as the resident representative of their own government or so ...

, representing

Joseon Joseon ( ; ; also romanized as ''Chosun''), officially Great Joseon (), was a dynastic kingdom of Korea that existed for 505 years. It was founded by Taejo of Joseon in July 1392 and replaced by the Korean Empire in October 1897. The kingdom w ...

interests in the '' Tongsinsa'' (diplomatic mission) to the Ashikaga shogunate (''Muromachi bafuku'') in Japan.

1443 mission to Japan

King

Sejong Sejong (; 15 May 1397 – 8 April 1450), commonly known as Sejong the Great (), was the fourth monarch of the Joseon dynasty of Korea. He is regarded as the greatest ruler in Korean history, and is remembered as the inventor of Hangul, the n ...

dispatched a diplomatic mission to Japan in 1443, which was the 25th year of King Sejong's rule. This embassy to court of

Ashikaga Yoshimasa "Ashikaga Yoshimasa" in ''Encyclopædia Britannica, The New Encyclopædia Britannica''. Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica Inc., 15th edn., 1992, Vol. 1, p. 625. was the eighth ''shōgun'' of the Ashikaga shogunate who reigned from 1449 to 1473 du ...

Kamakura , officially , is a city of Kanagawa Prefecture in Japan. It is located in the Kanto region on the island of Honshu. The city has an estimated population of 172,929 (1 September 2020) and a population density of 4,359 people per km2 over the tota ...

was led by Pyŏn Hyomun. Its purpose was to offer condolences on the death of

Ashikaga Yoshinori was the sixth ''shōgun'' of the Ashikaga shogunate who reigned from 1429 to 1441 during the Muromachi period of medieval Japan. Yoshinori was the son of the third ''shōgun'' Ashikaga Yoshimitsu. Titsingh, Isaac. (1834). His childhood name ...

and congratulations on the accession of Ashikaga Yoshikatsu.Kang, Etsuko H. (1997)
''Diplomacy and Ideology in Japanese-Korean Relations: from the Fifteenth to the Eighteenth Century,'' p. 275
Titsingh, Isaac. (1834)
''Annales des empereurs du japon,'' p. 342.
/ref> The Japanese hosts may have construed this mission as tending to confirm a Japanocentric world order. Pyŏn Hyomun's actions were more narrowly focused in negotiating protocols for Joseon-Japan diplomatic relations. Korean diplomatic efforts produced an agreement in 1443, also called the "

Kakitsu was a after '' Eikyō'' and before '' Bun'an''. This period spanned the years from February 1441 through February 1444. The reigning emperor was . Change of era * 1451 : The era name was changed to mark an event or a number of events. The pr ...

treaty" after the

Japanese era name The or , is the first of the two elements that identify years in the Japanese era calendar scheme. The second element is a number which indicates the year number within the era (with the first year being "", meaning "origin, basis"), followed b ...

(''nengō'') which identify the years 1441 through 1444. The agreement regularized an initial plan for mitigating the damage caused by pirates. The bilateral agreement assigned the responsibility for monitoring ships from Japan en route to Korea. The

Sō clan were a Japanese clan claiming descent from Taira no Tomomori. Papinot, Jacques Edmond Joseph. (1906). ''Dictionnaire d’histoire et de géographie du Japon''; Papinot, (2003)"Toki," ''Nobiliare du Japon'', p. 56 retrieved 2013-5-10. The clan ...

of Tsushima han ( Tsushima Island) were given the right to license ships sailing west beyond Tsushima; and this also encompassed the opportunity to profit from whatever fees the Sō might charge.

Recognition in the West

PyŏnHyo-mun's historical significance was confirmed when his mission was specifically mentioned in a widely distributed history published by the Oriental Translation Fund in 1834.Titsingh, p. 342. In the West, early published accounts of the Joseon kingdom are not extensive, but they are found in ''

Sangoku Tsūran Zusetsu __NOTOC__ by Hayashi Shihei (1738–1793) was published in Japan in 1786. This book represents one of the earliest attempts to define Japan in terms of its outer boundaries. It represented a modern effort to distinguish Japan from the neighbo ...

'' (published in Paris in 1832),Vos, Ken
"Accidental acquisitions: The nineteenth-century Korean collections in the National Museum of Ethnology, Part 1,"
p. 6. and in ''Nihon ōdai ichiran'' (published in Paris in 1834). Joseon foreign relations and diplomacy are explicitly referenced in the 1834 work.

Notes

References

* Daehwan, Noh
"The Eclectic Development of Neo-Confucianism and Statecraft from the 18th to the 19th Century,"
''Korea Journal'' (Winter 2003). * Kang, Etsuko Hae-jin. (1997). ''Diplomacy and Ideology in Japanese-Korean Relations: from the Fifteenth to the Eighteenth Century.'' Basingstoke, Hampshire; Macmillan. ; * Kang, Jae-eun and Suzanne Lee. (2006). ''The Land of Scholars : Two Thousand Years of Korean Confucianism.'' Paramus, New Jersey: Homa & Sekey Books. ; *

Hall In architecture, a hall is a relatively large space enclosed by a roof and walls. In the Iron Age and the Early Middle Ages in northern Europe, a mead hall was where a lord and his retainers ate and also slept. Later in the Middle Ages, the gre ...

, John Whitney. (1997). ''The Cambridge History of Japan: Early Modern Japan.'' Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press Cambridge University Press was the university press of the University of Cambridge. Granted a letters patent by King Henry VIII in 1534, it was the oldest university press in the world. Cambridge University Press merged with Cambridge Assessme ...

. ; * Titsingh, Isaac, ed. (1834). iyun-sai Rin-siyo/Hayashi Gahō, 1652">Hayashi_Gahō.html" ;"title="iyun-sai Rin-siyo/

iyun-sai Rin-siyo/Hayashi Gahō, 1652 ''Nipon o daï itsi ran">Hayashi Gahō">iyun-sai Rin-siyo/Hayashi Gahō, 1652">Hayashi_Gahō.html" ;"title="iyun-sai Rin-siyo/Hayashi Gahō">iyun-sai Rin-siyo/Hayashi Gahō, 1652 ''Nipon o daï itsi ran; ou
Annales des empereurs du Japon.
' Paris: Royal Asiatic Society">Oriental Translation Fund of Great Britain and Ireland The Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, commonly known as the Royal Asiatic Society, was established, according to its royal charter of 11 August 1824, to further "the investigation of subjects connected with and for the encourag ...

OCLC 84067437

External links

Joseon Tongsinsa Cultural Exchange Association
{{DEFAULTSORT:Pyŏn, Hyomun Year of birth unknown Year of death unknown 15th-century Korean people 15th-century Korean diplomats 1440s in Japan 1443 in Asia 15th-century agronomists Chogye Byeon clan, Hyo-mun

1443 mission to Japan

Recognition in the West

See also

Notes

References

External links