Samguk Sagi
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Template:Koreanname hanja noimage Samguk Sagi (Chronicles of the Three Kingdoms) is a historical record of the Three Kingdoms of Korea: Goguryeo, Baekje and Silla. The Samguk Sagi is written in Classical Chinese (as used in writing by Korean scholars at the time) and its compilation was ordered by Goryeo's King Injong (r. 1122-1146) and undertaken by the government official and historian Kim Busik (金富軾) and a team of junior scholars. It was completed in 1145. It is well known in Korea as the oldest extant Korean history.
The work's 50 volumes (or gwon 卷, originally meaning "scroll") are comprised of:
- Records of Silla (Nagi; 나기 羅紀, or Silla bongi 本紀) (16 volumes)
- Records of Goguryeo (Yeogi; 여기 麗紀/Goguryeo bongi) (10 volumes)
- Records of Baekje (Jegi; 제기 濟紀/Baekje bongi) (6 volumes)
- Chronological tables (nyeonpyo 년표 年表) (3 volumes)
- Monographs (also translated as Treatises) (ji 지 志) (9 volumes): ceremonies and music (the two were intimately connected), transport and housing, geography, and official offices and ranks
- Biographies (yeoljeon 열전 列傳) (10 volumes)
In taking on the task of compiling (this term is more accurate than "writing" because much of the history is taken from earlier Chinese and Korean histories) the Samguk Sagi Kim Busik was consciously modeling his actions on Chinese imperial traditions, just as he modeled the history’s format after its Chinese forebears. Specifically, he was harking back to the “Grand Historian” himself, Sima Qian (ca. 145-90 BCE) of the former Han Dynasty (206 BCE-24 CE), the title of whose singular history of China, the Shi ji (Korean sagi), Kim Busik adopted for his own work. Adopted as well from Chinese historiographical tradition was the classic four-part division of the standard dynastic history into Annals (bongi 本紀), Tables (pyo 表), Monographs (ji 志), and Biographies (yeoljeon 列傳).
There were various motivating factors behind the compilation of the Samguk Sagi in the 12th century. These may roughly be categorized as ideological and political. The ideological factors are made manifest in the work's preface, written by Kim Busik, where the historian states,
"Of today’s scholars and high-ranking officials, there are those who are well-versed and can discuss in detail the Five Classics 五經 and the other philosophical treatises...as well as the histories of Qin and Han, but as to the events of our country, they are utterly ignorant from beginning to end. This is truly lamentable." In this quote can be discerned two clear motives. One was to fill the vast gap in knowledge concerning Korea's Three Kingdom Era. Though each of the three kingdoms of Goguryeo, Baekje, and Silla had apparently produced their own histories these were largely lost in the wars of unification and the annihilation of Goguryeo and Baekje and the dispersal of their populace. The other motive was to produce a history that would serve to educate native Korean literati in native history, and provide them with Korean exemplars of Confucian virtues. This was especially important in early Goryeo as that dynasty became increasingly Confucianized.
But there were other factors not so clearly discerned. In Chinese tradition the compilation of a dynastic history also served political ends. The dynastic history was written by the succeeding dynasty and the very act of writing it served to illustrate that that succeeding dynasty had inherited the mandate to rule from its predecessor. In this context it should be remembered that the compilation of the Samguk Sagi was an officially sponsored undertaking, commissioned by the Goryeo king, with the members of its compilation staff approved by the central bureaucracy. As stated earlier, one aspect of its purpose would be to educate scholars and officials of the Confucianized bureaucracy in their native heritage, and native potential for attaining Confucian virtue. However, the fact that "native heritage" is primarily interpreted by the Samguk Sagi to mean "Silla heritage" brings us to the work’s ostensibly broader purpose, and that was to promote Silla as the orthodox ruling kingdom of the peninsula, and to thus solidify the legitimacy and prestige of the Goryeo state, as Silla’s rightful successor. In this way it helped confer the idea of zhengtong 正統, or "orthodox line of succession", upon the new dynasty. Though this objective was not stated in the memorial Kim Busik submitted in 1145, the intent was clearly understood. It was with just such intent that Goryeo's King Injong tapped Kim Busik to compile the history of the Three Kingdoms and of Unified Silla. Goryeo’s quest, through the writing of the Samguk Sagi, to secure its legitimacy, its carrying on of the "mantle of authority" (or Mandate of Heaven) from Silla, meant by consequence that the compilers of the Samguk Sagi emphasized the moral excellence, if not superiority, of Silla, and therefore its rightful place as unifier and ruler of the peninsula. This aspect of the work comes across clearly in the pages of the history. In the Biographies portion for instance, not only are an overwhelming majority of the subjects Sillanese (86%), but the Silla biographies are filled with glorious exemplars of loyalty and bravery, while Baekje and Goguryeo are all but neglected. Further, Kim Busik often refers to Baekje and Goguryeo forces with the term jeok (적 賊), meaning bandit or thief, the term used in official Chinese histories to refer to rebels, or those who did not submit to the rule of the "legitimate" dynasty. That is not to say that eminent figures do not appear in the biographies of Baekje or Goguryeo figures, for they do. No attempt is made by Kim Busik, for example, to hide the merit of the Goguryeo warrior Eulji Mundeok in bravely and competently defending his homeland against invaders from Sui.
The Samguk Sagi is heavily reliant upon earlier Chinese histories, especially for the history of Goguryeo and Baekje. Though Kim Busik was apparently ignorant of, or scoffed at quoting, Japanese histories, he lifts generously from the Chinese dynastic and even unofficial histories, most prominently the Wei shu 魏書 (Book of Wei), Sanguo Zhi 三國志, Jin Shu 晉書, Jiu Tangshu 舊唐書 (Old history of Tang), Xin Tangshu 新唐書 (New history of Tang), and the Zizhi Tongjian 資治通鑑 (Comprehensive mirror for aid in government).
Some modern historians are critical of the records provided in the Samguk Sagi, citing a bias towards China and the Silla-centered view of the Three Kingdoms period. Kim Busik was a patrician of Silla origin, and though he himself was a practicing Buddhist, he supported Confucianism over Buddhism as the guiding principle of governance and favored presenting tributes to the Chinese emperor to prevent a conflict with China and in deference to the lofty (sadae).
However, what all historians agree upon is that Kim Busik's history is critical to the study of Korean history during the Three Kingdoms and Unified Silla periods. Further, recent archeological evidence, verification of astronomical events, and comparison with Chinese and Japanese records have shown the Samguk Sagi to be surprisingly accurate.
This book is to be distinguished from the Chinese Chronicles of the Three Kingdoms by Chen Shou.