[KS] Koreanstudies Digest, Vol 128, Issue 51

Sat Mar 1 10:36:58 EST 2014

Dear Mark Byington,

Thank you very much for your good response!

My major is not history but international politics. As a political
scientist, I would like to confirm the most up-to-date historical or
archaeological evidence between Xiongnu and Choson. In a situation
of absence of such evidence, our historical imagination must be adopted to
understand the international politics of the age. Yes, I can understand
your viewpoint on my first question properly from the perspective of
standard historical studies. From the standpoint of international politics,
however, I have some different ideas from you. "The structure of
international system is always *oligopolistic*. In each period the
principal actors have determined the system more than they have been
determined by it." Raymond Aron, *Peace and War: A Theory of International
Relations*, p. 95. According to Aron's theory, David Curtis Wright's
argument is deadly accurate. He said like this: "... I accept Rossabi's
premise (in his *China among Equals: The Middle Kingdom and Its Neighbors,
10th - 14th centuries*) that parity characterized Sung diplomacy but with
the following caveat: The concept of an entire international community of
equally sovereign and independent states did not exist in East Asia during
Sung times. Northern Sung China did not see itself as one state among many
equals but as a state with only *one* equal: Liao." Wright, *From War to
Diplomatic Parity in Eleventh Century China: Sung's Foreign Relations with
Kitan Liao*, p. 2. In international political terminology, It is "bipolar
system."  By the same token, the international political system dominated
by Han - Xiongnu relation is also bipolar system. Korean states in the
history of Northeast Asia cannot be 'primary' actor in the bipolar system.
Gary Ledyard aptly said that point like this: "... Korea is not in either
case the primary object of action, but only a secondary object. The primary
battle is between Manchuria and the Central Plain. Whichever power has the
momentum expects Korea's compliance in its design." Ledyard, "Yin and Yang
in the China-Manchuria-Korea Triangle" in Rossbi, ed., *China among Equals*,
p. 339. Given these, I would like to pay attention to phrases like these:
"... While the Turks, as the dominant contemporary nomad power in Mongolia,
were inescapably a major concern in Chinese foreign relations until the
mid-eighth century, Chinese rulers from Emperor Wen of the Sui dynasty
to Gaozong of the Tang dynasty were also obsessed with the conquest of
Koguryo. ... While the newly founded Tang regime under Gaozu was largely
occupied by the Turkish problems in its frontier affairs, Gaozu maintained
peaceful relations with Koguryo and the other two Korean kingdoms." Pan
Yihong, *Son of Heaven and Heavenly Qaghan: Sui-Tang China and its
Neighbors*, pp. 204-207. "... The restoration and maintenance of imperial
unity ... was clearly the central task of the early Sui military. There
were also other problems to be dealt with, however. Most important of these
was the challenge posed by the nomadic Turks... Relations between Sui and
Koguryo took a turn for the worse in 607, when Emperor Yang discovered that
the Koreans had been engaged in secret negotiations with the Eastern Turks.
After the king of Koguryo refused his summons to appear in person at the
Sui court, Emperor Yang began to make deliberate preparations for another
northeastern campaign." David A. Graff, *Medieval Chinese Warfare, 300-900*,
pp. 142-143. Along with Kwon O-jung and Kim Byung-joon's articles, I would
like to pay attention to 李秉斗, "漢四郡 說置의 歷史的 背景" <中齊 張忠植博士 華甲紀念論叢: 歷史學
篇>, pp. 21-14 and Maurizio Riotto's paper attached etc. *What do you think
about their two articles?*

My understanding on Wang Mang's policy is based on Riotto's paper attached
and some other materials. *Could you introduce me your references?*

Several years ago, Thomas Barfield answered my third question like this:
"Yes, this a good possibility. Both the Turks and Tang competed for control
of overlapping territories in the Northeast, while in the Han dynasty the
Hsiung-nu seemed only to be interested in controlling the steppe nomadic
tribes (Wu-huan, Hsien-pi). However if the Tang's more important goal was
control of the Korean peninsula, then the move into the Northeast was a
step to that and hurting the Turks just a bonus." (May 20, 2011). I would
like to understand your argument in detail. *Could you introduce me some
relevant references? *

Yes, I have O Yong-chan's book, 낙랑군 연구.

Thank you again for your kind response.
Yours,

Yi, Hyunhwee.

On Thu, Feb 27, 2014 at 7:24 AM, <koreanstudies-request at koreanstudies.com>wrote:

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> <<------------ KoreanStudies mailing list DIGEST ------------>>
>
> Today's Topics:
>
>    1. Re: "cutting the left arm of Hsiung-nu" (Byington, Mark)
>    2. Re: Variable Romanization of ?(?) in McCune-Reischauer
>       (Clark W Sorensen)
>
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: "Byington, Mark" <byington at fas.harvard.edu>
> To: Korean Studies Discussion List <koreanstudies at koreanstudies.com>
> Cc:
> Date: Wed, 26 Feb 2014 15:43:51 +0000
> Subject: Re: [KS] "cutting the left arm of Hsiung-nu"
>
>
>
> Hello,
>
>
>
> Regarding the Han claim that the campaign against Chosŏn was intended
> either to break an alliance between the Xiongnu and Chosŏn or to prevent
> one from forming (“cutting off the left arm of the Xiongnu”), there are at
> least two general views among scholars specializing in that period. The
> first sees it as an accurate description of a real alliance, while the
> other sees it as an unrealistic pretext for an attack that was actually
> launched for other reasons that might not make Han look very good if
> presented openly. The problem is that there are no historical records
> clearly indicating the existence of an alliance between Chosŏn and the
> Xiongnu, and in my view there are geographical limitations that may have
> made such an alliance unlikely to begin with. Some scholars used to argue
> that the elaborate “northern-style” belt buckles excavated from tombs in
> Pyongyang indicate relations with the Xiongnu, but more recent scholarship
> has suggested that those buckles were actually manufactured in Han China
> specifically for the frontier market (there is some convincing discussion
> of this in the 2006 book 낙랑군연구 by O Yŏng-ch’an). So there doesn’t seem to
> be any historical or archaeological evidence for a real alliance between
> Chosŏn and the Xiongnu, which invites consideration of the possibility that
> the Han claim was simply rhetoric to justify a campaign launched for other
> reasons (and there are many ideas concerning what those other reasons might
> have been – Han expended considerable resources in the process of
> subjugating Chosŏn, so the motivations must also have been considerable).
>
>
>
> Two chapters in a new Early Korea Project volume titled “The Han
> Commanderies in Early Korean History” (which I edited) may be useful in
> understanding the range of possibilities for the Han conquest of Chosŏn –
> those by Kwon O-jung and Kim Byung-joon. These are interesting in that they
> adopt very different but equally convincing views.
>
>
>
> Your description of the 12 AD incident in which Koguryŏ troops were
> dispatched against the Xiongnu seems to warrant some clarification. These
> were troops conscripted by Wang Mang to be used in a campaign against the
> Xiongnu. The Koguryŏ ruler did not reject the request for troops (“demand”
> might be a better word, as it was probably a requirement based on the
> formal relations between Koguryŏ and Han) – instead, the troops were
> dispatched as required, but they fled en route to the battlefield, as
> indicated by the fact that it was the Governor of Liaoxi who was tasked
> with chasing them down. In response to this defection (and the subsequent
> death of the Governor of Liaoxi at the hands of the Koguryŏ conscriptees he
> was pursuing), Wang Mang held the Koguryŏ king responsible and, against the
> advice of certain of his ministers, had the Koguryŏ king lured to Xuantu
> commandery and executed. It was due to this act that the Koguryŏ and their
> neighbors (including the various Mark groups and, possibly, Puyŏ) reacted
> by raiding Han’s borders for several years. Very similar events were taking
> place at the same time on Han’s southern frontier. So to conclude, there
> was no implied connection between Koguryŏ and the Xiongnu in the account of
> the 12 AD incident.
>
>
>
> Lastly, with regard to the Sui/Tang campaigns against Koguryŏ, these
> should not be seen as due primarily to the threat of a Koguryŏ alliance
> with the Turks, though that would have been a realistic concern during the
> Tang period. The initial Sui attack on Koguryŏ was a complex matter that
> had more to do with an ongoing attempt by Sui to compromise Koguryŏ’s
> western and northern flanks by entering into formal relations with Mohe
> (Malgal) groups neighboring Koguryŏ. To prevent this, Koguryŏ sent a large
> campaign to purge the Sumo Mohe (Songmal Malgal) leaders from the old Puyŏ
> region (around modern Jilin); when Sui took in these displaced Mohe and
> settled them at Yingzhou, Koguryŏ responded with a strike on Yingzhou, in
> Sui territory, which gave Sui the excuse it needed to launch the first
> large-scale assault against Koguryŏ (the first of several military
> failures). Under the Tang the Koguryŏ relations with the Turks would have
> been a concern, but so would the unfinished business left between Koguryŏ
> and Sui following the latter’s collapse.
>
>
>
> I hope this is helpful – I am afraid that it is difficult to make such
> clean comparisons as you propose, though these examples are all useful
> illustrations of the complexities involved in multi-state relations in
> early northeast Asia.
>
>
>
> Best Regards,
>
>
>
> Mark Byington
>
>
>  ------------------------------
> *From:* Koreanstudies [koreanstudies-bounces at koreanstudies.com] on behalf
> of Yi, Hyunhwee [spcltn at gmail.com]
> *Sent:* Monday, February 24, 2014 5:08 PM
> *To:* koreanstudies at koreanstudies.com
> *Subject:* [KS] "cutting the left arm of Hsiung-nu"
>
>  Dear Sirs,
>
> I would like to ask you some questions concerning Han China Wu-ti's grand
> strategy, "cutting the left arm of Hsiung-nu."
>
> Nichola di Cosmo said in his book, *Ancient China and its Enemies*, like
> this: "... Unless we understand the relationship between the Hsiung-nu and
> the oasis people, we cannot properly assess how Han conquest of the region
> affected the war between the two empires. ... the only reason for the
> Chinese expansion in Central Asia was the desire to stop the invasion of
> the Hsiung-nu, or, as the ancients said, to 'cut off their right arm,'
> i.e., to deprive them of their western bases. The territorial conquests of
> the Han were dictated by the military necessity to cut off the Hsiung-nu
> from those areas that supplied them with provisions: the Kansu Corridor,
> the oases of Central Asia, and southern Manchuria. ... The Chinese military
> and political presence in Central asia therefore became vital to the Han
> overall strategy of weakening the nomads and was accomplished mainly
> through the establishment of farming colonies managed by the military. ..."
> (pp. 249-250).
>
> I would like to understand the strategic meaning of "cutting the left arm"
> of the Hsiung-nu, too. In the fall of 109 B.C., Han Wu-ti started to launch
> a campaign against Chosen (Korea). After the conquest of Chosen, Wu-ti
> established four Chun in the Northeast area, Hsuan-tu, Lo-lang, Chen-p'an,
> and Lin-t'un, for the purpose of cutting the left arm of hsiung-nu.
> * Then, did 'cutting the left arm of Hsiung-nu' imply any
> politico-military connections between Chosen and Hsiung-nu? Were there just
> some possibilities of alliance between Chosen and Hsiung-nu? *
> Let's us review other similar case. in 12 CE, Goguryeo (Korea) rejected
> the request of Wang Mang for Goguryeo to join China in a military campaign
> against the Hsiung-nu. Instead, Goguryeo chose to attack Wang Mang.
> *Why? Were there also politico-military connections between Goguryeo and
> Hsiung-nu? *
> In my view, Sui and T'ang's persistent campaigns against Goguryeo is
> comparable to Han Wu-ti's campaigns against the Western regions. *Can I
> understand the ultimate purpose of Sui and Tang's campaigns in the context
> of 'cutting the left arm' of the Turkish? *
>
> Your sincerely,
> Yi, Hyunhwee from Kyung Hee University, Seoul Korea.
>
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Clark W Sorensen <sangok at u.washington.edu>
> To: Korean Studies Discussion List <koreanstudies at koreanstudies.com>
> Cc:
> Date: Wed, 26 Feb 2014 09:27:19 -0800 (PST)
> Subject: Re: [KS] Variable Romanization of 년(年) in McCune-Reischauer
> Werner,
>
> The pronunciation of 외국 사람 as ö:guk saram was not accompanied by a glide,
> and, as I have indicated in the transcription was clearly pronounced as a
> long vowel. This was the village head calling in my residential
> registration to the township police. His speech was slow and clear, and I
> have the impression that the village head perceived this to be a prestige
> pronunciation. The example of 교회 might more accurately be transcribed
> kyöhö, and I heard it in rapid very dialectical speech (that I barely
> understood) from a women whom I conversed with on a rural road. I have
> never heard a clear example of 위 pronounced as ü, however.
>
> As long as we're talking dialect, the part of Kangwon Province that I was
> in was about 25 km southwest of Ch'unch'ŏn, and thus within the central
> dialect region that includes Seoul (though there was enough distance from
> Seoul speech that it took me several months to catch on to the dialect).
> The east coast of Kangwŏn Province, of course, is in an entirely different
> dialect region (more like Kyŏngsang dialect). Villagers in the area around
> Ch'unch'ŏn would tell me that they could not understand that dialect.
>
> Clark Sorensen
>
> On Wed, 26 Feb 2014, Werner Sasse wrote:
>
> Hi Bob,
>> thanks, yours is the second posting with Kangwon-do coming in, so there
>> must be something here.
>> But again, I wished somebody tested whether the Kangwon-do [ö] is really
>> close to the German  [ö]. There are a lot of
>> possible variations in the Umlaut, and when I say In do not hear it, I am
>> not referring to "similar" but to "same"...
>> Thank you for pointing out Young-Key Kim-Renaud, I will look into that
>> when I am back in Korea
>> Best wishes
>> Your Werner
>>
>> ____________________________________________________________
>> __________________________________________________________
>> From: ramsey at umd.edu
>> To: koreanstudies at koreanstudies.com
>> Date: Wed, 26 Feb 2014 03:04:15 +0000
>> Subject: Re: [KS] Variable Romanization of 년(年) in McCune-Reischauer
>>
>> Hey Werner!
>> Great to hear you chime in.  Yes, I did do a lot of listening to Lee Sung
>> Nyong back in the day.  But that was
>> admittedly a long time ago.  The person I know who most clearly uses [ö]
>> in his speech is Lee Iksop.  (He and I talk
>> to each other pretty frequently.)  Now, it's true (as you probably know)
>> that though he's lived much of life in Seoul,
>> he's originally from 강원, which means he's not completely representative
>> of the Seoul standard. But he's also a
>> phonologist, and he assures me that the umlaut pronunciations do
>> represent actual pronunciations in the old Seoul
>> standard, at least in certain phonological environments.  (Young-Key
>> Kim-Renaud, who is a native of Seoul and a
>> phonologist, has described the realizations of those vowels in more
>> detail in her recent book, but I don't have that
>> handy right now.)
>>
>> I hope you're having fun in India!
>> Bob
>>
>>
>>
>> From: Werner Sasse <werner_sasse at hotmail.com>
>> Reply-To: Korean List <koreanstudies at koreanstudies.com>
>> Date: Tuesday, February 25, 2014 1:32 PM
>> To: Korean List <koreanstudies at koreanstudies.com>
>> Subject: Re: [KS] Variable Romanization of 년(年) in McCune-Reischauer
>>
>> Hi, Bob,
>> this starts to be really interesting.
>>
>> > You're certainly right that we don't hear 외 pronounced as [ö], or 위 as
>> [ü], very often today, at least not in
>> Seoul.
>> Well really, I never hear the German [ö], or  [ü], only in discussions
>> with linguists who also speak German well.
>> There is always a slight glide in what I hear. I wished, someone would
>> make decent research based on electronic
>> recordings.
>> However, when I was teaching German in the late 60ies, one of the biggest
>> problems was that the students (coming from
>> all over Korea) had a hard time trying to get even near the pronunciation
>> and were simply unable to make it a habit.
>>
>> > But in the past the vowels were certainly described as having those
>> phonetic values, just as Martin says.
>> Yes: "described", and by linguists, who were looking for standards... I
>> am sorry, but here is really my suspicion: I
>> do not trust the books as long as I cannot hear it in the street.
>> (Please, I know this is dangerous, as I am not
>> basing my suspicion on research, but my exposure to Korean spans almost
>> 50 years now, and even if I know that
>> prejudices can last long...)
>>
>> > The ROK government document 표준바름범 'Standard Pronunciation' published in
>> 1989 informs us that the umlaut
>> > pronunciations are standard, which means that the authors of the
>> document must have been taking the speech of older
>> Seoul
>> > natives (think of Lee Sung Nyong) as the model
>> Here we go again: "government document 표준바름범 'Standard Pronunciation'
>> "... Linguists, of course...
>> And now: " which means that the authors of the document must have been
>> taking the speech of older Seoul
>> natives (think of Lee Sung Nyong) as the model." Well, you talked with
>> him much more often than I ever did, but did he
>> really use  the German [ö], or  [ü]? It did not strike me (but then, that
>> was not really the question on my mind when
>> I talked to him)
>>
>> o.k. I may all be wrong. But I am glad that my somewhat flippant remark
>> starts such an interesting discussion on the
>> question of  how much in our descriptions is biased because of our
>> training which makes us see and hear things
>> pre-patterned .
>>
>> Another question in this respect is: How much is the regular 이/가
>> opposition of today the result of school grammar
>> (again: the linguists). The few prose texts from the 19th century I saw
>> do present chaos (is 가 possibly emphatic?)
>> Ooooch...
>>
>> I am in India at the moment: I hope it is not that the sun is too hot...,
>> best wishes, and I hope we have a chance to meet again soon
>> Your Werner
>>
>> > From: ramsey at umd.edu
>> > To: koreanstudies at koreanstudies.com
>> > Date: Tue, 25 Feb 2014 15:00:38 +0000
>> > Subject: Re: [KS] Variable Romanization of 년(年) in McCune-Reischauer
>> >
>> > You're certainly right that we don't hear 외 pronounced as [ö], or 위 as
>> [ü], very often today, at least not in
>> Seoul. But in the past the vowels were certainly described as having
>> those phonetic values, just as Martin says. The
>> ROK government document 표준바름범 'Standard Pronunciation' published in 1989
>> informs us that the umlaut
>> pronunciations are standard, which means that the authors of the document
>> must have been taking the speech of older
>> Seoul natives (think of Lee Sung Nyong) as the model. Cf. Lee and Ramsey,
>> "The Korean Language" (2000), page 64.
>> >
>> > Best,
>> > Bob Ramsey
>> >
>> > -----Original Message-----
>> > From: Koreanstudies [mailto:koreanstudies-bounces at koreanstudies.com]
>> On Behalf Of Otfried Cheong
>> > Sent: Tuesday, February 25, 2014 1:57 AM
>> > To: Korean Studies Discussion List
>> > Subject: Re: [KS] Variable Romanization of 년(年) in McCune-Reischauer
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > On 24/02/14 13:38, Werner Sasse wrote:
>> > > Right you are. Reminds me of Korean scholars in "Germanistik", who try
>> > > to convince me that Korean 외 is identical with German /ö/ : The
>> > > linguist's need or wish to make a rule, which sometimes is overriding
>> > > simple observation, a not uncommon occupational disease amongst us
>> > > scholars (and not only linguists)
>> >
>> > I have been wondering about this for a long time. When I first learnt
>> Korean, I had some tapes that turned out to
>> have been recorded a long time ago, possibly in the 1950's (with example
>> sentences like "This towel costs 23 Won").
>> >
>> > One of the speakers on those tapes systematically pronounced 외 as /ö/
>> > and 위 as /ü/. If I remember right, the textbook explained that this
>> > pronunciation was a valid variant used by some speakers.
>> >
>> > I have met two (unrelated) senior Professor Choi's, who both told me
>> that their name is properly pronounced /chö/,
>> even though they did not seem to use the /ö/ variant in their own speech.
>> >
>> > Samuel Martin's "A reference grammar of Korean" (my copy was published
>> in 1992) describes /외/ on page 24 as the
>> front rounded mid vowel, that is /ö/. However, he says that "in standard
>> Seoul speech 외 is not distinguished from
>> 웨", and "many speakers tend to pronounce 위 as a long monophthong /ü/
>> rather than the more common diphthong".
>> >
>> > I personally do not remember meeting a Korean who used the monophthong
>> variants, and when I ask younger Koreans
>> about this, they are completely baffled. They never heard about this
>> variant, and have no idea why Goethe is spelled
>> 괴테.
>> >
>> > When I point out to them that adding 이 to 아 and 어 moves the vowel from
>> the back to the front of the mouth, and
>> that the logical generalization would be for 외 and 위 to be fronted 오 and
>> 우's, they agree (with surprise) that
>> Hangul is inconsistent - but they still can't accept the variant as
>> correct Korean, or think of anyone who speaks like
>> that.
>> >
>> > When did this variant fall out of usage? Or has it always been a
>> regional variant? Is it still alive somewhere?
>> >
>> > Best wishes,
>> > Otfried Cheong
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>>
>>
>>
>
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