[KS] Imgu P'ung family and the Chojongam

[Adam Bohnet]

I would like to respond to the comments made by Dr.
Peterson and Mr. Mason on the subject of the Imgu
P'ung family and the Ming Shrine on Chojong-am.


The man Dr. Peterson met was almost certainly Mr.
P'ung YOngsOp. I have not had the pleasure myself (and
perhaps it is too late), but I am not surprised to
hear that Dr. Peterson met him in the Kyujanggak, as a
quick look at the several volumes of photocopied books
that he has produced suggests that he spent a great
deal of time in the Kyujanggak (and the ChangsOgak,
and the Kungnip Chungang TosOgwan  ... ) indeed. The
books - which include the TaemyOng yuminsa, the
KuUisajOn, the Chojongam munhOn-rok, and, of course,
the Imgu P'ungssi chokpo - include collections of
documents on Ming families in Korea starting with the
Imjin War (actually, the TaemYong yuminsa takes the
discussion down to the early Ming) to the present day.

Mr. P'ung was evidently a very generous man. The texts
which he allowed Mr. Mason to view he also has
generally allowed others to view as well - they are
all collected together in reasonably accessible form
in his various photocopied collections of documents
which I list above. They are found in a number of
universities, including Yonsei. Not all these books
are very easy to use - they seem to me to be several
generation photocopies. However, he engaged in vast
amounts of work (I think he must have copied out
hundreds and hundreds of pages of hanmun out by hand.
I am ashamed to say that I am exhausted after twenty)
and I am extremely thankful to him.

It is a bit of a trial to visit the site (called the
Chojong-am) at least for car-less graduate students,
but it is well worth the trouble. Contact the Kap'yOng
town office and they will provide you with directions.
TaeMyOng is not the only inscription on the rocks in
the area, and I spent an enjoyable Remembrance Day
reading the others. The site is not that far, I think,
from the famous hill where the Princess Patricia
regiment stood their ground (at least according to my
risible 'boy's book of battles' understanding of
Canada's role in the Korean War), and the bullet holes
scattered in the rocks around the site suggest that
this Imjin War memorial may have seen some action
during the Korean War as well, perhaps involving
Commonwealth soldiers. There is a modern building
nearby called the Taet'ongmyo.

The Imgu P'ung Family are one of the KuUisa or Nine
Righteous Literati (I don't claim that to be a good
translation). These were former, supposedly loyal,
Ming officials who accompanied Pongnim Taegun (the
future Hyojong) from Mukden to ChosOn. I have some
ill-defined doubts about his narrative, and these
doubts may become better defined when I finish my
thesis. 

It would seem that, during the 19th century, the
Chojong-am became somewhat less of a shrine to the
Ming emperor and somewhat more of a family shrine for
these Ming refugees. There were Ch'ungsin descendents
(for instance Kim P'yOngmuk) who were involved as
well, and the Mr. Kim that Mason refers to may have
been Kim P'yOngmuk's descendent.

The kind man who showed me around the Taet'ongmyo (a
modern structure built near the site) was not of the
Imgu P'ung family but of another KuUisa fmily, the
Chenam Wang family. He emphasized that the Chinese
connection was "a long time ago" and no longer seemed
to think of himself as an exiled Ming official (which
Mr. P'ung did think, at least to go by his writings.)
He said that the ceremony was still going on, but that
it attracted less support from the members of the nine
families, and also was no longer receiving the same
political and financial support that it had from the
South Korean and especially Taiwanese governments. The
People's Republic of China, he told me, had not been
interested in taking up the slack after Taiwan
abandoned them following South Korea's recognition of
the mainland. I do have the number for the
Taet'ongmyo, but I don't remember where.

On the whole, while I did not have the pleasure to
meet Mr. P'ung directly, but I don't agree with Mr.
Mason's characterization that he was "uninterested in
the modern world." His writings suggest considerable
knowledge about the modern world indeed. Also, you
don't empty the pockets of the Taiwan and the South
Korean governments with Chinese poetry alone. I expect
that he was quite savy, on the whole. He may have
rejected numerous aspects of modernity, while
employing some aspects, such as anti-Communism and
recognition of Taiwan as the true successor to China. 

Also, to go by P'ung's books, Mr. Mason's article was
not the first piece of journalist attention, as I
believe there were a number of reasonably lengthy
articles written in Korean in Korean newspapers before
that. But it is very nice to hear that Mr. P'ung
provided such support and encouragement to other
scholars, including Mr. Mason.

Yours sincerely,

Adam Bohnet

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