A Translation and Study of the Mongolian Khan’s Edicts in the Goryeosa (1270-1280)

The Goryeosa is the principal source of official Korean history (정사. 正史) critical to studying that period of history and including data on politics, economy, society, culture, and biographies of public figures of the Goryeo Dynasty. Therefore, wide ranges of studies have been done on Goryeosa in South Korea such as history study, manuscript analysis, literature study and culture studies. Our scholars have studied the Goryeosa in great detail, e. g. in such works as Correspondent Letters of Mongolia and Korea between the 13th and 14th Centuries by B. Sumiyabaatar, Tradition of Communication between Mongolia and Korea by B. Lkhagvaa, etc. There is a lot of information and facts related to Mongolia in the Goryeosa, and when it comes to certain figures, one can mention 136 letters sent from Mongolia to Goryeo and 171 letters sent from Goryeo to Mongolia from 1218 to 1294 included into the Goryeosa’s 'Sega' Section identified by Sc. D. B. Sumiyabaatar in his research. The present articles examines 620 communication letters and other related information and facts of the two countries recorded between the years 1270 to 1280, and shows additional detailed studies of the Goryeosa to be conducted by Mongolian scholars are significantly required. The paper aims to insure letters and edicts sent by the Great Khan of the Mongol Empire to the Goryeo Kingdom by stressing information and facts related to Mongolian language, culture, historical monuments, politics and foreign relations as described in the Goryeosa’s 'Sega' Section (1270-1280) which contains important information about the history and culture of the Middle Ages of not only Korea but also those of Mongolia. The mentioned 'Sega' Section (1270-1280) contains a total of 620 documents related to Mongolia of which 34 ones are edicts and records about the edicts sent by the Mongolian Great Khan to Goryeo, of which 16 papers in Chinese and 18 ones contain their related information. The titles indicate edicts sent to Goryeo’s King by the Mongolian Great Khan during the period under consideration can be divided into two main sections, namely: firstly, letter documents, and, secondly, edicts or instruction edicts. The five edicts of the total 34 edicts are referred to as 'edicts' or 'shengzhi (聖旨)' in an ancient Korean copy of the Goryeosa. The others are referred to as 'letters' in the original. This is based on an ancient Korean hardcopy since we have no Mongolian copy of the edicts. Therefore, this research leads us to reclaim what edicts and letters in the dynastic period actually are, including their forms and distinctiveness. Several dozens of communication and official letters related to different periods of Mongolian history have survived as real hardcopies and indirect copies. The documents transcribed by the Mongolian Great Khan and his royal princes can be deliberated by categorizing as of edicts, words, letters and authorized passages. This explains what the king’s edicts are, i. e. letters and written transcripts in relation to our subject. The edict is “a decree and resolution issued by the Great Khan in Mongolian is 'zarlig', while a direction and decree by other king’s royalty, queens, heads of regions, ministers and officials is called 'word', and this can be viewed as the uniqueness of chancellery recording of the Dai Yuan Dynasty which expands around 100 years from the declaration of the Dai Yuan Empire by Kublai Khan in 1260 to Toghon Temur Khan's leaving Daidu in 1368”. Edicts of Mongolian Kings begin with “Under the Eternal Universe’s Power” and the translation of the word in Chinese is 上天眷命; the phrase is commonly used in all edicts and letters once passed in the written form under administration of the Great Yuan Empire. The Dai Yuan Empire’s Khan’s edicts were called differently - 'shengzhi (聖旨)' and 'zhao (詔)', and this was strictly observed. 'Shengzhi' is a Chinese translation of the word 'edict' from Mongolian, while 'zhao' means 'edict' as originally written in Chinese. The above mentioned edicts had been originally written in Mongolian or square script, and were later translated into Chinese. However, there is no Chinese translation of the phrase “Under the Eternal Universe’s Power” which is written in beginning of the Mongolian Khan’s edicts. Except for this, considering whether the original Mongolian edict was translated to Chinese raises the question where the original Mongolian hardcopy is. Also, these are not full length edicts and their indirect data drawing our major interest. This might be explained in connection with the Square Script. The letter of January - 'black dog day' - 1273 notes that “... the King has received the Huangdi’s letter brought by Yuan Empire’s ambassador, but it was written in newly created Mongolian script and there was no person to translate, thus, the Mongolian ambassador provided contents description”. The newly created Mongolian script is certainly the Square Script. The Square Script had been created in 1269, and from that period onward the edicts and orders were written in Square Script, not in the traditional Mongolian script. This can be found in late Korean information source: “There are two types form in Mongolian script. One is called Uigurjin (Mongolian script) while another one is Durvuljin (Square Script). In the early time, the Square Script (Durvuljin) was used in letter and official documents and Mongolian script was used in running every day matters”. The edicts of Kublai Khan on spreading of the Square script provided a very clear paragraph about it: “Any jade stamp and issued edicts should be written in new Mongolian script (square script) and attach other national script with it”. Thus, from here we may draw an assumption that the edicts studied here had been sent to Goryeo not only written in Square Script, written in Chinese, and the edicts noted in the Goryeosa may have direct reflection of that. Examining the edicts sent to Goryeo by the Mongolian Great Khan from 1270 to 1280 included in the Goryeosa and among them the edicts submitted in 1273, one can clearly see all of them were indirect implications. From this perspective, the edicts subject to our study here can be separated into three categories by their contents, namely the edicts with their contents fully noted, the edicts with contents not fully noted in Chinese and only briefly noted contents, and the edicts with contents not noted at all. a) The edicts with contents fully noted or as full Chinese source. Edicts of this type number 16. On those could not see content’s general form and phrase words of Mongolian official document uniqueness of that time period. It can be explained as followed. 1. From the Kublai Khan’s period, the Great Khan’s edicts begin with “Under the Eternal Universe’s Power, with Great Ingenious Benevolence Khan’s Edicts this is”, i. e. the three rows of firm phrases, and on the above edicts these phrases are absent. 2. These edicts were written as 'zhao' (or 'letter') in Chinese that raises the probability of them having been written in Chinese from the start. Based on these, the edicts discussed here were noted in the Goryeosa not as Mongolian original script but rather written keeping content and compositing Korean sources form by breaking the Chinese script’s distinctiveness. b) The edicts with contents not fully noted, and only brief content noted in Chinese original. These types of edicts number 13 within the scope of our study. This can be explained by that as firstly the edict’s content and importance were not so high therefore it was probably just briefly noted. Nonetheless, one cannot deny the connection between the introduction of Square Script or new script and the fact that the Great Khan’s letters had not been fully recorded. At least two of the Mongolian Great Khan’s letters were received a year, and as was mentioned previously the letters sent from January of 1273 to August of 1274 and received during this a year and seven month period, i. e. the six Grand Khan’s letters, were not fully noted in the source and only it’s content was written and this draws great interest. c) The ambassador came to Goryeo from Mongolia, and we found four records about the contents of the letters which were not noted but only described the arriving date of the ambassador in Goreyo and how the Grand Khan’s letter was brought and received. These letters may be connected to the reputation and sore truth of history of the Goryeo dynasty. If the above mentioned information existed, the King’s transcript minister should have at least briefly noted the content of the letter, not mentioning writing in full. Whereas, it was not noted at all and this attracts significant interest. This may be explained, in some way, in connection with Yan Seongji (양성지. 梁誠之)’s proposition of: "The “Goryeosa” have many notes about protest and unrest and describes bare truth in many instances … protests and unrests were not only in the previous dynasty, it is present in any country at any generation, he underlined that the Goryeo dynasty cannot be compared with land owned by under Chinese medieval royals, and this should not be reason of the point of the matter, even “The History of Yuan” is spread by the Ming dynasty, the Goryeosa should not be held and not spreading, if there is something not to be exposed there is a way to distribute leaving sensitive sections” … in 1451, the Goryeosa was ready but for long time it had not been announced, and the government was demanded to announce it many times in the year 1469.

История династии Корё, Монгольское ханство, хан Хубилай, указ, грамота

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