[KS] Chinese influence/presence in Korea

[Hilary K Josephs]

Dear colleagues:

First of all, let me thank everyone who has responded to my query. I will try to follow up on your recommended readings.

A couple of further refinements to my original query:

1. Is it possible to tell from someone's surname whether he had Chinese antecedents (dating back to whatever period)? The number of common Korean surnames seems very limited--Kim, Yee, Yoo, etc. A few years ago when I was touring the Confucian temple at Qufu, our driver was surnamed Jin 靳. I had never met anyone with that surname. He said that his family had been settled in southern Shandong since the Ming dynasty, but given that his surname was so unusual there, he speculated that his forebears were from Shanxi province. In the case of European immigrants to North America, it was not at all uncommon for people to anglicize their names. But if someone today has the surname DePasquale he is likely to be of Italian descent, and if his surname is Horowitz, Ashkenazi Jewish.

2. By Choson I assume people are referring to the dynasty which came to a definitive end with the Japanese annexation in 1910. Did the Choson administration keep census registries for all persons resident in Korea including "hwangjoin"? After the Japanese annexation did the Japanese administration keep census registries and records of comings and goings?

Thank you for your assistance.

Best regards,HKJ


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