'Destroyed' surnames

By Mark Peterson

As a contrast to the names that have survived in Korea for 1,500 years and more, there were names that did not survive. I've been writing about how remarkable, and even unusual, the Korean surname situation is ― specifically, the concentration of just a few surnames.

Five surnames ― Kim, Yi (Lee), Pak, Choe and Jeong (Chung, Jung) ― make up 55 percent of Korea's population. I have previously emphasized how unusual this is and how it is one of the solid evidences that Korean history has been marked by stability and peace.

However, there have been some exceptions. There are surnames that have not survived. But this fact does not contradict the thesis (that Korean history should be seen as remarkably peaceful, and should not be characterized as war-torn and unstable), but rather, the "destroyed" surnames illustrate the thesis.

I have offered before that the Kims of the Gaya Kingdom survived very well in the Silla Kingdom after the Silla took over Gaya. Kim Yu-sin, the great general of the unification of Silla who conquered Baekje and Goguryeo, was a grandson of the last Gaya general. Not only did he have an important position, second only to the king, his sister married the king! This is remarkable in light of the extremely hierarchical system of Silla, known as the "bone-rank system" (golpumje).

And moving forward, Silla is an ally of Later Goguryeo against Later Baekje. When Later Goguryeo wins the war, Silla, the ally is recruited to assist the new state, now called Goryeo, and much of the aristocracy of Silla move from Gyeongju to Gaeseong.

But what of the loser? Baekje was first defeated by Silla, and Later Baekje was defeated by the Silla-Later Goryeo alliance. What happened to the aristocracy of Baekje?

They disappeared from the Korean Peninsula. Some of the Baekje surnames appeared in either China or Japan, for we know that Baekje had active diplomatic relations with both neighboring countries.

We know eight names of Baekje aristocracy. They were Sa, Yeon, Hyeop, Hae, Jin, Guk, Mok, and Baek. None of these names exist in Korea today. If you are familiar with Korean names you might object to this statement, because there are people with some of these names, apparently, in modern Korea. But it turns out the Chinese character is different; therefore, there is a homophonic name today, but the same name does not exist.

It's possible that in some cases, the surname changed its character to a homophone and indeed it is the same Baekje group, but the chances of that happening are quite remote, for if someone wanted to change their name to hide in a hostile social setting, choosing a homophone doesn't serve their purpose.

As examples, the name Sa is quite rare today, but the character used today is the character for history, 史, whereas the characters from the Baekje period was the character for sand, 沙. Similarly, the characters for the names Yeon, Jin, Guk, Mok, and Baek ― names that exist in Korea ― are homophones. The characters used with those pronunciations today are different from the characters that were used in the Baekje Kingdom. And Hyeop and Hae do not exist in Korea today at all.

There was one other case of surname destruction by annihilating the aristocratic family that was in the leadership of a fallen dynasty. It was the slaughter of the Wang clan at the fall of the 918-1392 Goryeo Kingdom.

Wang was the surname of the clan that were descendants of Wang Geon, the founder of the dynasty. He gave his surname to some of his supporters. When Yi Seong-gye toppled Goryeo and established the Joseon Kingdom (1392-1910) he did so in basically one afternoon. Unlike other dynastic transitions in other countries that take years and decades to accomplish, the Goryeo-Joseon transition was relatively smooth and quick. But there was some blood-letting after Yi Seong-gye grabbed power and the target was mostly the Wang royal relatives.

There is some interesting genealogical folklore about this. It is said that many people with the surname Wang changed the Chinese character for their name (王) by adding a stroke or two or more to create a new name and hide their identity as relatives of the Goryeo royalty. They were Ok (玉), Jeon-1 (田), Jeon-2 (全), Gim (金) and possibly some others.

The intended extermination, however, was not complete, and as time went by, some segments of the Wang clan not only survived in the Joseon period, but they flourished. We have records of 10 individuals named Wang who passed the all-important high civil service exam in the Joseon period, and there are about 25,000 people with that name in Korea today.

But the important point to remember is that these cases of obliterating surname groups were the exceptions. The rule in Korea was that the aristocrats and aristocratic names of Silla continued onward into Goryeo and onward into the Joseon period. The exceptions highlight the rule.

Mark Peterson (markpeterson@byu.edu) is professor emeritus of Korean, Asian and Near Eastern languages at Brigham Young University in Utah.