Yeon Gaesomun
From Free net encyclopedia
Template:Koreanname hanja noimage
Yeon Gaesomun (603? - 666?), was a Goguryeo general of noble birth. In 642 he had the Goguryeo's King Yeongnyu killed and seized supreme power. He then installed King Bojang as a puppet ruler. This act of regicide was specified by Tang as a primary motive for its 645 invasion of Goguryeo. As military dictator, Gaesomun led the country's defense against this initial attack by Tang, and then again against a Tang-Silla alliance.
Our knowledge of Yeon Gaesomun comes largely from his biography in the Samguk Sagi, itself largely taken from Chinese sources such as the Tang histories. They portray a man of intemperate cruelty and arrogance. His familial origins are obscure but under King Yeongnyu he did become commander of the western district (西部). Yeon Gaesomun's 642 coup d'etat came as the culimnation of a lengthy power struggle within the Goguryeo aristocracy. Charged with the defense of the country's borders, Gaesomun had grown impatient with the country's policy of appeasement towards Tang. It is related that various Goguryeo chieftains had plotted secretly with King Yeongnyu to have Gaesomun killed but their plans were leaked out. As a result, in 642 Gaesomun arranged a lavish banquet, summoning the major ministers of state, while also ordering the soldiers under his command to proceed there for an official review. Once arrived his soldiers killed the high state officials before proceeding to the palace to murder King Yeongnyu. After placing Bojang 寶藏王 (reigned 642-668), nephew of Yeongnyu, on the Goguryeo throne Gaesomun appointed himself Mangniji 莫離支 (an obscure office of Tang times but carrying with it the notion of commander of military affairs), and in this role went on to assume de facto control over Goguryeo affairs of state until his death around 666. His arrogance was so described that he would have men prostrate themselves so that he might use their backs to mount or dismount his horse and none dared meet his gaze. His role in the murder of the Goguryeo king was taken as the primary pretext for the failed Tang invasion of 645.
He supported Taoism at the expense of Buddhism, and in 643 sent emissaries to the Tang court to request Taoist sages, eight of whom were brought to Goguryeo. It became rather standard practice among later Korean Confucian historians to point to Gaesomun's support of Taoism as a contributing factor to Goguryeo's subsequent fall. In any case, good relations with Tang did not last long, as Tang grew angry with Goguryeo interference in their diplomatic contacts with Silla. This led to a massive punitive expedition in the winter of 645, in which only the steadfast resistance of Yang Man-chun at a border fortress saved the rest of Goguryeo from serious danger.
The strict nature of Yeon Gaesomun's military rule can probably be credited with the kingdom's ability to resist the Silla-Tang invasion of 661, despite a lengthy siege of the Goguryeo catpial at Pyongyang. After his death, the country was weakened by a succession struggle between his several sons, and in 668 fell relativley swiftly to the Silla-Tang armies.
The date of Yeon Gaesomun's death varies by source. The most widely quoted date is that given by the Samguk Sagi, which records it as 666. However, the Japanese history Nihonshoki gives the year of his death as the twenty-third year of the reign of King Bojang (664). The most likely date seems to be that recorded on the tomb stele of Namsaeng, Yeon Gaesomun's eldest son: the twenty-fourth year of the reign of Bojang (665). In any case, he apparently died of natural causes. The ensuing political instability following his death contributed to Goguryeo's fall at the hands of a Silla-Tang alliance two years later. Yeon Gaesomun had three sons, (eldest to youngest) Yeon Namsaeng, Yeon Namgeon, and Yeon Namsan. After their father's death the sons engaged in a violent political struggle for power, with the youngest son the apparent victor. Yeon Namsaeng ultimately sought refuge and aid in Tang and aided that power in its campaign of 668 that sealed Goguryeo's fall.
Chinese sources give Yeon Gaesomun's surname as Cheon 泉 (Chinese Quan). This divergence is likely a result of Yeon (Chinese, Yuan) being the given name of Tang Gaozu (Li Yuan 李淵), founder and first emperor of Tang, and thus taboo to apply to another by Chinese tradition (see naming taboo). He is also sometimes referred to as Gaegeum (개금/蓋金).
Much of what we know about Yeon Gaesomun comes from the Samguk Sagi's accounts of Kings Yeongnyu and Bojang (Goguryeo vols. 8-10) and its biography of Yeon Gaesomun (vol. 49), from surviving tomb engravings belonging to his sons Yeon Namsaeng and Yeon Namgeon, and the biographies of those same sons that appear in the Xin Tangshu (New History of Tang).