Dr Isabelle Sancho

What might be called "pre-modern" Korean studies today are about a century old in France. They started almost by accident at the end of the 19 th century when missionaries, diplomats, and orientalists were dispatched to Chosŏn Korea at the time of the European expansionist policy in East Asia. Some initiatives taken by a handful of individuals to raise awareness of Korea in France (especially Maurice Courant) have produced unexpected scholarly achievements that have been only recently acknowledged. After World War II, Korean studies in France have been progressively institutionalized in universities and higher education institutions (Paris Diderot, INALCO, EHESS, EFEO, Collège de France) with the help of specialists of close areas. The first generation of French pre-modernists have played a crucial role in building up the field of Korean studies in France (Li Ogg, Daniel Bouchez, Marc Orange). Today, pre-modern Korean studies is a strong subfield within the field of Korean studies in France. French pre-modernists (Elisabeth Chabanol, Kim Daeyeol, Yannick Bruneton, Isabelle Sancho, Pierre-Emmanuel Roux), who are holding key positions in academic institutions, networks, and structures, are very active in France and abroad. They maintain the community of Korean studies in France

their importance in academic structures and activities, French pre-modernists have to face several challenges, in a difficult context combining the massification of undergraduate students population following the newly acquired attractiveness of Korean culture in France on the one hand, and large-scale reforms of French higher education and research sector on the other hand. Their most urgent task is to produce teaching and research materials for students, colleagues, and general audience. By training the next generation and developing both the knowledge and interest for premodern Korea, they must try to establish in the future long-lasting foundations for their specialty that has still to be built properly, while contributing to the further development of Korean studies in general.

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Korean studies in France have been progressively implemented from the 1950's onwards in French universities and other higher education institutions. But the first French studies about Korea appeared more than fifty years earlier, at the end of the 19 th century. At the time when the European powers were conducting their expansionist policy in East Asia, French missionaries, diplomats, and orientalists were dispatched to Chosŏn Korea, a country still little known in France. Isolated initiatives taken by some of them to create awareness about Chosŏn Korea in France produced unexpected scholarly achievements. These studies and materials might be labelled nowadays as "pre-modern" studies, since they were mostly focusing on the history, culture, and language from the last Korean dynasty, which is usually considered, taken as a whole, as the "pre-modern period" according to the common periodization of Korean history. Missionaries, diplomats, and ethnographers who were in some cases interpreters, orientalists, art collectors, and bibliophiles were all contemporary observers of Chosŏn Korea. They were interested in introducing the country in France for different purposes : justification for Catholic proselytism, diplomatic activities, ethnographic interest, orientalist erudition, but also career advancement or even pastime. But after the annexation of Korea by Japan, knowledge about the country was no longer a priority issue for France and Korean studies had to wait the end of World War II to start developing in French academia.

French orientalism and Chosŏn Korea at the turn of the 20 th century

France and Korea came into their first contact when the Catholic missionnaries from the Paris Foreign Missions Society 2 started to spread from China into the Korean peninsula, which was seen as a true Christian land. The proselyting of these missionaries have caused substantial troubles to Chosŏn Korea but also to the French-Korean diplomatic relationships until the 21 rst century. 3 Yet it must be acknowledged that the first scholarly work in Western language about Korea 4 was achieved by a French priest who had never even set foot on Korea. Following the killing of "the martyrs of Korea" in 1866, Charles Dallet (1829-1878), 5 a zealous missionary, wrote the History of the Church of Korea. This work, published in 1874 in two volumes and 1174 pages, was a compilation of the materials gathered by several French priests who served in the peninsula, among whom Antoine Daveluy, apostolic vicar of Korea and martyr. 6 It is a rich historical document providing detailed information about 19 th century Korea. In particular, the 192-page introduction has attracted the attention of generations of Korea specialists, for it describes in an anthropological way the geography, history, society, political organization, religions, foreign affairs, oral and written languages of the late Chosŏn Korea. 7 Besides the missionaries, the diplomatic community played a key role in developing French knowledge about Korea. Many members of the French diplomatic corps have studied -in the past but also today-at the Ecole spéciale des Langues Orientales 8 that was created 2 Missions étrangères de Paris (M.E.P). 3 A well-known example is the French campaign against Korea in 1866 in Kanghwa island and the seize of precious books among which the Royal Protocols (Uigye 儀軌) from the Outer Kyujanggak Library. 4 Only one previous work about Korea had been published in Europe at tha time. It is Hendrik Hammel's famous captivity narrative, published in the 18 th century in the Netherlands and translated into French and, then in English. 5 Claude-Charles Dallet (1829-1878), from the Paris Foreign Missions Society, spent most of his missionary life in India. 6 Bishop Marie-Nicolas-Antoine Daveluy (An Toni 安敦伊, 1818-1866) compiled the first Korean-French dictionnary (Hanhanbul sajŏn 韓漢佛辭典), wrote a Chronological chart of Korean history (Chosŏn yŏndaep'yo 朝鮮史年代表), and translated several texts related to Korean history into French to be sent to the M.E.P. After his death, all of his writings were sent to the archives of the M.E.P where Dallet would use them. 7 The introduction was translated in Korean in 1947 and 1966, and 11 Hong Chongu 洪鍾宇 (1850-1913) assassinated in 1894, one year after leaving France, the reformist Kim Okkyun 金玉均 (1851-1894) in Shanghai, served in the late Chosŏn administration as a reward, and was finally relegated because of his strong anti-Japanese stance before dying unknown. 12 J.-H. Rosny is a pseudonym used by Joseph Henri Honoré Boex (1856-1940) and his younger brother Séraphin Justin François Boex (1859-1948). They were French authors of Belgian origine who wrote, together or separately, science fiction. The Quest for Fire (La guerre du feu), published in 1911, is attributed to J.-H. Rosny but was written by Joseph Boex. After 1908, the two brothers put an end to their collaboration and started to use sometimes two different pen-names : "Rosny Aîné" (Rosny Senior) for Joseph and "Rosny Jeune" (Rosny

The particular case of Maurice Courant

These features of the first French writings about "pre-modern" Korea are worth noticing but not surprising, unlike the particular case of one single individual whose contribution to Korean studies unfortunately gained recognition only belatedly. 14 Maurice Courant (1865-1935), another graduate from the Langues Orientales in Chinese who was at first a Chinese interpreter at the French Legation in Beijing, was sent in Korea in 1890 to be Collin de Plancy's assistant. During the two years he spent in Korea at that time, he had been preparing two monumental and remarkable works that are worth praising until today.

The young Maurice Courant, who was at first bored by his stay in Korea, was given the task by Collin de Plancy and Mgr Mutel, the bishop of Korea, to catalogue all the Korean books known and available. After travelling throughout the Korean peninsula and collecting varied information through research conducted in libraries, bookstores, Buddhist temples, and catalogues with the help of Korean assistants, he achieved the first drafts of the Korean Bibliography which was published after he left Korea. 15 The whole work in three volumes lists 3821 books published in Korea from the origins to 1890, most of which are minutely described through bibliographical notices and sometimes illustrations. 16 During his relatively short stay in Korea in the 1890's, Courant also took the initiative to write a manuscript in order to compete for an award given by the Langues Orientales that Junior) for Séraphin. The French translation of the Ch'unhyang chŏn was signed J.-H. Rosny but was probably done by Séraphin Boex in cooperation with Hong Chongu. 13 This translation was published in 1892 in a small book format (7.5 x 13.5 cm) : Le printemps parfumé, roman coréen, traduction de J.-H. Rosny [jeune], Petite collection Guillaume, Paris, E. Dentu, 1892. In 1895, after Hong Chongu had left for Korea, a text titled "The dry wood flourished again" (Le Bois sec refleuri) was published by the Guimet Museum. That was a French translation of a manuscript attributed to -and probably written by-Hong Chongu from heterogeneous body of Korean historical texts and literary tales, among which the Tale of Sim Ch'ŏng (Sim Ch'ŏng chŏn 沈淸傳). The letters sent by Courant to Collin de Plancy show that, despite his first negative impressions of Korea, Courant definitely fell under the charm of the country, praising its rich history and distinctive culture. 22 If circumstances of the small and great history had been different -especially if Choson state would not have collapsed and Korea would not have 17 Cf. Daniel Bouchez (ed), fac-simile with a presentation by Bouchez and an index of modernized transcriptions by Min Yông-ûi, Cahiers d'études coréennes n°3, Collège de France, Paris, 1986, 436 pages. 18 Han'guk yŏktae haengjŏng-kwanjik ch'ongnam 한국 역대 행정-관직 총람. 19 Only a fac-simile of the manuscript was published by Daniel Bouchez at the Collège de France in 1986. Considering the importance of the work, the Center for Korean Studies at EHESS made efforts to transform that edited manuscript into a searchable document, available for the academic community. In 2007 Alain Delissen, the director of the CKS, charged Pierre-Emmanuel Roux with typing the whole document in a Word document that could be made available on-line and with adding Modern Korean transcriptions and a few commentaries. In 2015, as the director of the CKS, Isabelle Sancho supported Eun-joo Carré-Na, the research engineer of the CKS, to apply for funding to the Academy of Korean Studies (AKS) in order to digitalize the manuscript and add three different indexes. Courant's Répertoire historique de become a Japanese colony-Courant would probably have tried to grant Korea the status of a proper academic field in France in the early 20th century. In that case, pre-modern Korean studies might have developped in France one century earlier and in a easier way.

The first specialists of pre-modern Korea as pioneers of Korean studies in France

The creation of Korean studies in France have been made possible thanks to a specialist of Japan, the ethnologist and linguist Charles Hagenauer (1896-1976), who has been teaching partially Korean language and culture in Paris, as Courant did in Lyon, in the first half of the 20 th century. 23 In 1956 Hagenauer hired one Korean lecturer, Li Ogg (1928-2001), and the first national degree in Korean studies was established in 1959 at Sorbonne University, and then the same year the Langues Orientales also created its own degree in Korean. Li Ogg was a specialist of Korean ancient history and defended his PhD about Koguryŏ in 1977 at the University of Paris Diderot (Paris 7). 24 He became the first full professor of Korean in France in 1983. During his career, he has published several teaching and research materials about Korean history, mythology, and language for students and general audience. 25 In the the early 1970's appeared another prominent figure of the first generation of Korean studies, who was a pre-modernist as well. Daniel Bouchez (1928-2014), a former catholic missionary in Korea from 1958 to 1970, was a specialist of Korean literature and language (hangŭl, middle Korean, hanmun). During his late but prolific career as an international specialist of Korea, he published and presented a number of studies that are still regarded as references. 26 His main focus of study was Kim Manjung 金 萬 重 (1637-1692) and his 23 28 The Association for Korean studies in Europe (AKSE) was created in 1976 by Frits Vos (The Netherlands), William Skillend (Great Britain) and Li Ogg (France). The first AKSE conference was held in 1977. French is among the official languages of AKSE (other languages are German, English, and Korean). Among French scholars of the first generation, Li Ogg, Daniel Bouchez, André Fabre, and Alex Guillemoz have acted as the presidents of the AKSE. Besides, there have always been at least one representative of France sitting in the AKSE council, as well as in the committee for the Korea Foundation Fellowships in Europe. 29 Association Française pour l'Etude de la Corée (AFPEC). 30 at the Ministry of Foreign affairs that are related to Korea until August 1910 before the annexation by Japan and has been continuously interested in the relationships between France and Korea from the 19 th century to the beginning of the 20 th century. 33 These three figures, who were studying and teaching about pre-modern Korea, were among the founders of Korean studies in France but also in Europe. With their modernist colleagues, [START_REF]Li Jine-Mieung and[END_REF] they tried to build up the field of Korean studies in French academia. They have been now replaced and outnumbered by a new generation that is holding positions in Paris but also in several big cities.

The places of pre-modern Korean studies in France today

The French system of higher education and research has a long and complex history, and has been undergoing large-scale reforms since a few decades. To sum up and try to map out the places where pre-modern Korean studies are done more specifically in France today, let us briefly mention the four institutions where permanent teaching and research staff specialized in pre-modern Korean studies have been recruited in recent years.

The first one is Paris Diderot University with one full professor in pre-modern studies, Yannick Bruneton, [START_REF] Bruneton | He also studied in Korea at Yŏngnam University and then at the AKS[END_REF] and one assistant professor in pre-modern studies, Pierre-Emmanuel Roux. [START_REF] Roux | The anti-christian trinity : essay on the proscriptioin of catholicism in China[END_REF] The second place is the Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales (INALCO ; the former Langues Orientales), with one full professor in pre-modern studies, Kim Daeyeol. 37 Paris Diderot University and INALCO are part of the same association of higher education institutions called Comue 38 Université Sorbonne-Paris-Cité (USPC). This Comue gathers the greatest numbers of under-graduate students in Korean studies in France. 39 The third place is the Research Center on Korea (Centre de recherches sur la Corée CRC) at the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences (Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences sociales, EHESS), 40 with the only one researcher from the National Center for Scientific Research in France (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique CNRS) appointed to it since 2009, 41 Isabelle Sancho. 42 The EHESS is part of the Comue Université de recherche milieu du XIX e siècle" (The Cross, the whale, and the cannon : France facing Korea in the mid-19 th century), Paris, Les éditions du Cerf, 460 p., for which he was awarded the prize Auguste Pavie of the Académie des sciences d'outre-mer in 2012. He was a Korea Foundation post-doctoral fellow at the Ruhr university-Bochum and is an associate researcher at the CECMC at our joint unit "China, Korea, Japan." Among his publications : 37 Kim Daeyeol (born 1964) studied chemistry and the history of religions at Seoul National University in the 1980's and 1990's. Then he came to France and studied art history and archeology as well as the history and anthropology of religions at Sorbonne University (Paris 4). He obtained his PhD in anthropology of religions at Sorbonne university in 2000, "Symbolisme de la force vitale en Chine ancienne : Modèles et significations dans l'alchimie taoïste opératoire (études des pratiques alchimiques du Baopuzi neipian 抱朴子內篇 (4e siècle après J.-C. en Chine))" (Symbolism of vital force in ancient China : models and meanings in the operative Daoist alchemy (studies of achemic practices of the Baopuzi neipian)). He published articles in French, English and Korean. For a more detailed CV and bibliography of Kim Daeyeol, see http://www.inalco.fr/enseignantchercheur/daeyeol-kim. 38 Following previous laws that have been enforced successively to the sector of higher education and public research in France in the 2000's-2010's, the latest law adopted in 2013 has created the Communautés d'universités et d'établissements (COMUE or Comue ; "Groups of universities and institutions"). These Comues, of which there are 21 today, are associations of universities and higher education institutions, in charge of coordinating educational provision. They are under the umbrella of the Ministry of Higher Education and Research and fall under the category of "Public scientific, cultural or professional establishments," which have legal, administrative, and financial autonomies. 39 This academic year 2017-2018, at Paris Diderot University there are 136 students enrolled in Licence 1, 82 in Licence 2, 48 in Licence 3, 14 in Master 1, 13 in Master 2, and 1 PhD candidate. At the INALCO, there are 183 in Licence 1, 132 in Licence 2, 97 in Licence 3, 20 in Master 1, 35 in Master 2 and 2 PhD candidates (cosupervision) 40 As a post-graduate research center providing large library resources, mostly in Korean, the center gathers most of the French specialists of Korea as permanent members, affiliates, or associates. It is the most prominent research center devoted to Korean studies in France. 41 Every CNRS researcher, once hired by one of the disciplinary sections of the CNRS, is appointed by the CNRS in a joint research unit where they became a permanent statutory member of the staff of that unit. Appointed by the CNRS at the CRC, which is part of the joint unit CNRS-EHESS "China, Korea, Japan," Isabelle Sancho is thus a statutory member of the CRC which is a EHESS research center. The CNRS recruits a few researchers every year in each of its sections (disciplines). These recruitments are based on national recruitment procedures and researchers, who become French civil servants, are permanently recruited for the life-time research project for which they had been selected. Sancho is the only one CNRS researcher for Korean studies, since Orange's retirement in 2002. 42 Isabelle Sancho (born 1978) studied Chinese and Korean at the University of Bordeaux 3 and then at INALCO. She obtained her PhD at INALCO in 2006, "Chongsim ('rendre droit son coeur') : une notion IEC library provides about 30,000 books and periodicals (70% in Korean) about literature, history, philosophy, law, and arts, 50 and maintains also precious books coming from the Maurice Courant collection. 51 In large cities in France where Korean studies have been implemented since the late 1980's (Lyon, Bordeaux, Le Havre, La Rochelle, Aix-en-Provence), there are not as many permanent staff as in parisian institutions and there is no pre-modernist at all.

French pre-modernists today : some characteristics

Today there are five permanent teaching and research staff in pre-modern Korean studies in France : Bruneton (epigraphy, historiography, didactics of hanja and hanmun, focus on Koryŏ), Kim (cultural and religious history, history of science, focus on king Chŏngjo), Chabanol (archeology, three kingdoms, Silla and Koryŏ, focus on Kaesŏng), Sancho (intellectual history, Confucianism, translation, focus on Yulgok and Hwadam), and Roux (religious and legal history, comparative historiography of China and Korea).

They are all historians, covering together a period going from the Three kingdoms to the late Chosŏn. Most of them are from the same generation (late thirties-early fifties) and they are all very united among themselves, while working closely with modernists to develop Korean studies in France. Beyond this first statement, a couple of specific remarks can be made about them.

Firstly, they all have the status of government civil servents enjoying life-long permanent positions. One should however notice that there are two other PhD holders in pre-modern studies who do not have yet any permanent positions : Ariane Perrin (art history) and Noe Jeehyun (intellectual history and philology, focus on Tasan).

Secondly, they have all occupied or still occupy key positions in academic structures in France and Europe. Bruneton and Kim are the only full professors at Paris Diderot and France does not grant degrees and all lectures by professors are free and open to anyone. There is one Chair of Chinese studies and one of Japanese studies. There has never been a Chair for Korean studies. 49 The IEC was founded in 1959 at Sorbonne by Haguenauer, based on the personal library resources provided by the latter, and was transferred in 1973 to the Collège de France where it is part of the Institutes of the Far East. 50 The library catalog can be consulted online at http://bude.college-de-france.fr. Service (KSPS). 53 Kim is currently the head of the RESCOR 2 (2015-2020). 54 Chabanol is the head of the joint archeological mission in Kaesong. Sancho took the initiative to organize in Paris the first international Conference of pre-modern Korean studies in Europe 55 and sits in the screening committee for the Korea Foundation fellowships for Western Europe. Roux is a member of diverse international projects about Law in East Asia, among which one funded by the KSPS. 56 These main features demonstrate that French pre-modernists are all very dynamic on both national and international levels ; they dedicate a lot of time and energy for collective work and administration ; they are eager to develop the visibility of their area of expertise within the field of globalized Korean studies but also in French East-Asian studies. 52 The other two are both at the EHESS : Alain Delissen (modern historian) and Valérie Gelézeau (geographer). 53 The consortium was first based on existing networks (AFPEC, AKSE). The RESCOR 1 created and operated a collaborative website hosted at Paris Diderot University (http://www.reseau-etudes-coree.univ-paris-diderot.fr/) and a scientific blog hosted by one platform of OpenEdition, hypotheses.org (http://parisconsortium.hypotheses.org/). It organized five international workshops and conferences to delineate the objectives of the network, develop collaborative tools, identify the possible partners, and deepen the interactions between its members on national and international scales. 54 The on-going program of the RESCOR 2 (2015-2020), renewed thanks to another KSPS funding, pursues a slightly different purpose. While maintaining and enriching the website and digital library, it focuses on the strenghtening of francophone Korean studies through the funding of students (Master and PhD fellowships) and the publication of teaching and research materials in French by the founding members of the RESCOR. These materials can be put online and/or published in printed formats. 55 "Pre-Modern Korean Studies in Europe : Results, Projects, and Prospects," Paris, 20-22 January 2016, CRC, funded by the AKS, the CRC and the IEC of Collège de France. The objective of the conference was to bring together in an unprecedented academic event most of the European or Europe-based pre-modernists in Korean Studies. 56 Project directed by Jérôme Bourgon (CNRS-École Normale Supérieure of Lyon-University of Geneva) from 2011 to 2014, "Legalizing space in China : the shaping of the imperial territory through a layered legal system", and "Korean Law and History," a project funded by the Korean Society for the Promotion of Science (KSPS) and directed by Jérôme Bourgon and Marie Seonghak Kim (an attorney at law and professor of history at St. Cloud State University in the U.S.A).

Challenges

However there are two major challenges to which they must respond in the years to come.

The first problem is the very limited number of students they have collectively trained in about ten years. There is currently only one PhD student in pre-modern studies, Damien Peladan (maritime history, connected history, underwater archeology, Korean and Japanese historiographes), who is under the supervision of Bruneton and Guillaume Carré, a Japonologist from the EHESS. There are several explanations to this phenomenon. Chabanol and Sancho, as researchers, do not teach, Bruneton and Kim both became full professor only in 2016, and Roux was recruited in 2015. Besides, when considering their own trajectories, it is striking that only one of them is a pupil of the first generation of French pre-modernists, Bruneton, who is also the only one who studied partly in Korea. Chabanol is a graduate from the Ecole du Louvre and Sorbonne's Art history department. Kim, Sancho, and Roux have all majored in Classical Chinese studies in France under the supervisions of Sinologists.

The second problem, which partly explains the first one, is the lack of teaching and research materials for pre-modern studies in French (translations, textbooks, manuals of hanmum, maps, monographies). The first generation of pre-modernists did not leave systematic didactic materials because they were building up the field of Korean studies. Current pre-modernists have not published or achieved many materials either so far. Some of them are juggling between publishing and working mainly in English to gain more visibity on international stages (AAS, AKSE) and teaching and writing in French. All are burdened by their administrative workload in France. Their collective commitment in French academia is crucial to try to maintain Korean studies as a separately structured subfield as the on-going grand reforms tend to blend them within bigger area studies ("Asian Studies") and threaten the cohesion of Koreanists by putting their home institutions in competition with one another. This situation means that under-graduate students must rely mostly on materials written at best in English, which can be a real struggle for them, or directly in Korean, which is simply not realistic at under-graduate levels. Besides, with the dramatic massification of undergraduate students population that followed the newly acquired attractiveness of Korean culture in France due to the success of K-pop and South Korean entertainment culture in the last decade, classes are overcrowded, as there is no real selection process for admission to universities in France. Moreover, the younger generation of students is not interested in pre-modern period at all and, generally speaking, they do not intend to pursue into post-graduate degrees.

Conclusion

Today pre-modern Korean studies in France are strong, when one considers the sizeable number of specialists who have been recruited in permanent positions within the past two decades, thanks to the attractiveness of Korea as well as the willingness of French universities and higher education institutions to start acknowledging Korean studies as a meaningful field. These pre-modernists play a leading role in the collective effort to develop the community of French Korean studies in France and abroad with their modernist colleagues. But French premodern studies are still fragile at the same time. The reforms in the higher education and research sector in France as well as the dramatic boom of under-graduate students population, mainly interested in contemporary society, drain their energy and time. In order to build up true foundations to their subfield of specialty, they have now to keep focused on producing teaching and research materials in French. That is exactly the goal set by the RESCOR 2 and pre-modernists have already pledge themselves to publish and achieve several materials within the four years to come : a hanmun manual, a few bilingual and annotated translations (the biographies of monks from the Koryŏsa, a selection of novels by Pak Chiwŏn), a monography on Yulgok introducing ways of researching about Chosŏn Confucianism, a monography on the 18 th century focused on the reign of Chŏngjo, an anthology of pre-modern sources translated and introduced for students. These first few steps are, hopefully, expected to start laying the foundation upon which pre-modern studies in France could outlast the current generation in the future and become a true academic tradition.

  during the French Revolution in 1795 to train orientalists, interpreters, diplomats, and scholars. One famous graduate of this institution was Victor Collin de Plancy (1853-1923), who graduated in Chinese in 1876 and spent 13 years in Korea. He first went to Korea in 1887 to ratify the "Friendship and Trade agreement" signed in 1886. The year after, he became the Chargé d'affaires in Korea and started collecting about 700 ethnographic objects (including art works and fine porcelains) and rare books until 1891. Collin de Plancy sent several shipments of books to the Langues Orientales, building up the first library funds about Korea in France. 9 He also took the initiative to display a Korean pavillon at the Universal Exhibition of Paris in 1900. All the books presented at the exhibition were donated later to the Langues Orientales that had then at its disposal one of the most important collections of Korean books in Europe (630 books, 1400 volumes). Around the same time, the ethnologist Louis-Charles Varat (1842-1893) arrived in Korea for a fieldwork funded by the French Ministry of Education. With the help of Collin de Plancy he collected various artifacts and books written in hanmun and hangŭl in Seoul, Pusan, and Taegu that were given in 1893 to the Guimet Museum, which displays Asian arts in Paris. Back to France Varat wrote a 78-page travelogue in 1892 for the journal Le Tour du monde that published writings from famous explorers of the time. Varat illustrated his text with a map, more than a hundred drawings picturing people and lanscapes of Korea, and 39 drawings by the genre painter Kisan. 10 The history of the Guimet Museum is also related to French Korean studies because of Hong Chongu (1850-1913). 11 Probably better known as the assassin of the reformist Kim Okkyun (1851-1894), Hong Chongu in his younger days was the first Korean to come to France. He stayed from 1890 to 1893 in Paris and worked at the Museum thanks to the network he could build in the French capital city. He became the first co-translator of Korean literature in Western language. The French translation of the Ch'unhyang chŏn signed by J.-H. Rosny (Rosny Junior) 12 and Hong Chongu is also the first translation of an East-Asian literary work in France. 13 9 He sent three successive shipments in 1889, 1890 and 1891. 10 Kisan 箕山, Kim Chungŭn 金俊根 (dates unknown).

  Cf. Le Bois sec refleuri, traduit par Hong Tjyong-Ou, Annales du Musée Guimet, Bibliothèque de vulgarisation, Paris, Ernest Leroux, 1895. These two texts, introduced by An Sonjae (Brother Anthony of Taizé), has been published in 2016 by Atelier des Cahiers, Collection Seonbi, in collaboration with sallim publishing house in South Korea on the occasion of the France-Korea Years 2015-2016 14 Cf. Daniel Bouchez, "Un défricheur méconnu des études extrême-orientales, Maurice Courant (1865-1935)" (An unrecognized pioneer of Far-Eastern studies, Maurice Courant (1865-1935)), Journal asiatique, CCLXXI(1983), Paris, pp.43-150. 15 Bibliographie coréenne (Han'guk sŏji 韓國書誌). The monumental work was published by the Ecole des Langues Orientales at Ernest Leroux publishing house in three volumes from 1894 and 1897 and one Supplement presenting the books published until 1899 was added in 1901. Cf. Maurice Courant, Bibliographie coréenne. Tableau littéraire de la Corée contenant la nomenclature des ouvrages publiés dans ce pays jusqu'en 1890 ainsi que la description détaillée des principaux d'entre ces ouvrages, Ernest Leroux, Paris. A Korean translation was achieved in 1994: Lee Heejae (translator), Han'guk sŏji, Iljogak, Seoul, 1994. 16 Some books are no longer extant and are only known today thanks to Courant's work. The general introduction of about a hundred pages, giving an account of Korean culture, is still read by specialists. might help him obtain an academic position in France. That manuscript, in two volumes and 349 pages with an index, which remained unpublished until 1986, 17 is the Répertoire historique de l'administration coréenne. 18 This systematic work presents in an innovative way and consistently translates the administrative structures of the Chosŏn state into French equivalents. It is without precedent in either English or Modern Korean until today and was finally made available in 2017 in both French and Korean open archive platforms. 19 After several failed attempts to secure an academic position in either Chinese or Japanese in Paris, Courant finally became in 1900 a professor of Chinese at a newly created position at the University of Lyon where he mainly taught Chinese but also Korean culture. Before getting an injury to his right hand in 1910 that prevented him from writing, he left several writings about Korea. For example, he wrote the first travel guide of Korea ever published in the West 20 and authored the 66-page 1900, Souvenir de Séoul, Corée. Le pavillon coréen au Champ de Mars, which presents the Korean pavilion at the Universal Exhibition of Paris in 1900 with a rich iconography. 21

  Hagenauer has been teaching Japanese from 1932 to 1953 at the Langues Orientales Vivantes and from 1953 to 1967 at the Sorbonne University. In 1944-1945, he started teaching a small class of five students about Korean history and culture but had to interrupt it when, being a Jew, he had to flee to Southern France. Back in Paris after World War II, Hagenauer taught about religions of Japan and Korea between 1933 and 1967 at the Ecole Pratique des Hautes études (EPHE). Thanks to Hagenauer's efforts, Sorbonne University established in 1959 a national degree in Korean studies (Certificat d'études supérieures de coréen) and the Japanese Section was renamed the Section of Japanese and Korean studies. 24 Li Ogg, "Recherche sur l'antiquité coréenne, ethnie et société de Koguryŏ" (Research on Korean antiquity, ethny and society of Koguryŏ), University of Paris 7, 1977. 25 Li Ogg, Histoire de la Corée, collection Que sais-je ?, Presses universitaires de France, Paris, 1969 ; Li Ogg, Histoire de la Corée, des origines à nos jours, éditions du Léopard d'or, Paris and Aesan Hakhoe, Seoul, 1985 ; Li Ogg, Initiation à la langue coréenne, Kyobo editions, Seoul, 1985 ; Li Ogg, La Corée, Le Léopard d'or, Paris and Aesan Hakhoe, Seoul, 1988 ; Li Ogg, La mythologie coréenne et son expression artistique, Le Léopard d'or, 1995 ; Articles du professeur Li Ogg, Mémoires du Centre d'études coréennes, Institut d'études coréennes, Collège de France, Paris, 2003. 26 Bouchez became instructor in Korean studies both at Paris 7 and the EPHE (IV th Section) in the early 1970's. In 1972 he was recruited in his fourties as a permanent researcher at the National Center for Scientific Research (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, CNRS). While teaching he prepared and obtained a doctoral degree at Paris 7 in 1975. His dissertation, entitled « Les Pérégrinations de Dame Xie dans le Sud: étude sur un novels. 27 Bouchez was among the founding members and used to be the President of the Association of Korean Studies in Europe (AKSE) 28 and the French Association for Korean Studies. 29 Bouchez was the one who contributed to the belated recognition of Courant as the founding father of Korean studies in France and thus helped establish a history of the field. In 2007, he was made a Knight of the National Order of the Legion of Honour -the Order being the highest decoration in France -for his "eminent merits" and contribution to the knowledge of Korea in France A third founding figure of the first generation of French Koreanists is Marc Orange, who is also a pre-modernist and a founding member of the AFPEC. 30 He is among the two first graduates in the 1960's from the degree in Korean studies established by Hagenauer at Sorbonne University and was taught by Hagenauer and Li Ogg. 31 Under Li's guidance, Orange gave up writing a PhD dissertation in Law and specialized instead in Korean novels from the 18 th century (Tale of Lady Pak and Tale of Suk-Hyang) and became a translator of pre-modern but also modern literature. 32 Orange also worked on the French archives available roman coréen » (The journey of Lady Xie to the South: a study of a Korean novel) was published in 1984. Daniel Bouchez, "Tradition, traduction et interprétation d'un roman coréen, le Namjŏng ki" (Tradition, translation and interpretation of a Korean novel, the Namjŏng ki), Mémoires du Centre d'études coréennes, vol. V, Institut d'études coréennes, Collège de France, Paris, 1984 27 To the South (Namjŏng ki 南征記) and Dreams of nine clouds (Kuunmong 九雲夢). As the co-author and adapter in French of the History of Korean literature by Cho Tongil 趙東一 (born 1939), he contributed to a better understanding of Korean literary tradition in France and Europe. Cf. Cho Tong-il and Daniel Bouchez, Histoire de la littérature coréenne, des origines à nos jours, Fayard, Paris, 2002. Cho Tongil 조동일, Han'guk munhak t'ongsa 한국문학통사, chisik sanŏpsa, vol.1-5, 1982-1989.

  After obtaining a degree in Public Law and studying Chinese and Korean from 1962 to 1967, Orange finally turned into Korean studies and wrote a PhD on Korean literature. He taught at Paris 7 from 1971 to 2002 and at Paris 10 from 1971 to 1983. He was the director of the Institut d'études coréennes (IEC) of the Collège de France from 1992 to 2002 and was the président of the Association française pour l'étude de la Corée (AFPEC ) from 1995 to 2001. He was awarded the Prix Culturel Sejong (Sejong Cultural Award) in 2013. 31 André Fabre (1932-2009), a linguist who would later become a full professor of Korean at INALCO, graduated first in 1962 and Marc Orange in 1964. 32 Orange translated several times the Pakssi chŏn (Tale of Lady Pak). A first translation was published together with a translation of the Sukhyang chŏn (Tale of Sukhyang) in a volume published in 1982 : Marc Orange and Kim Su-Chung (trans.), Histoire de Dame Pak. Histoire de Suk-Hyang : deux romans coréens du XVIII e siècle (The Tale of Lady Pak and Tale of Suk-Hyang : two korean novels from the 18 th c.), l'Asiathèque, Paris, 1982. A second, revised translation with a fac-simile of the Korean edition was published in 2016 : Marc Orange (trans.), Histoire de Dame Pak 박씨젼, L'Asiathèque, Paris, 2016. He translated contemporary South Korean short stories : Une femme à la recherche d'une illusion (Woman in search of an illusion), Aibel and Fanlac, Lausanne and Périgueux, 1980 (reprint 2003).

  51 A survey of this collection maintained at the Collège de France has been carried out in 2010 and published in a bilingual edition (French-Korean) by the National Library of Korea : 국외소재 한국 고문헌 조사보고서 1.콜레주 드 프랑스소장 한국 고문헌. Rapport sur les documents anciens coréens présents à l'étranger I. Le fonds ancien coréen du Collège de France, 국립중앙도서관 The National Library of Korea, Seoul, 2012. Inalco. There are only four people authorized to supervise PhD dissertations in France and they represent half of them. 52 Chabanol is the head of the Seoul Centre of the EFEO. Sancho has been the director of the CRC -the only research centre of Korean studies in France-and the deputy director of the joint research unit "China, Korea, Japan" at EHESS from 2013 to December 2017. Roux became the director of the Korean section at Paris Diderot University right after being recruited. Thirdly, they are very active on the European and international scales. Bruneton was the secretary of the AKSE and organized the 2007 Conference in Dourdan. He was also the head of the RESCOR 1 (2010-2015), also called Paris Consortium. This multi-year research project, which aims to maintain a collaborative network of Korea specialists in France and francophone countries, is funded by a five-year grant from the Korean Studies Promotion

  the whole work in 1980 by the Institute of the History of Korean Church. Cf. 샤를르 달레 原著, 李能植 • 尹志善 共譯, 朝鮮敎會史序說, 大成出版社, 1947.

샤를르 달레 原著, 丁奇洙 譯, 朝鮮敎會史序說 , 探求堂, 1966. 샤를르 달레 原著, 安應烈 • 崔奭祐 譯註, 韓 國天主敎會史, 上 • 中 • 下, 분도출판사, 1879-1980. 8 Since the 1970's this higher education institution, colloquially referred at as Langues O', is called INALCO (Institut des Langues et civilisations orientales 이날코 동양어문화대).

  l'administration coréenne has been made available in both French and Korean open archive platforms (HAL and AKS) in 2017 : http://mauricecourant.huma-num.fr/repertoire/index.html and http://dh.aks.ac.kr/MauriceCourant/repertoire/index.html. 20 Cf. Maurice Courant, La Corée, in Claudius Madrolle (ed.), Chine du Nord et de l'Ouest, Corée, le transsibérien, Guide Madrolle, Comité de l'Asie Française, Paris, 1904. 21 This work was published in a trilingual edition (English, French, Korean) in Seoul in 2010. Cf. 모리스 꾸랑 의 서울 의 추억, 서울역사 박물관조사 연구과, 2010, 127 pages. This work was published in Korea thanks to the efforts of the Seoul Museum of History and Elisabeth Chabanol, the head of the Seoul Centre of the Ecole Française d'Extrême-Orient (EFEO ; 프랑스국립극동연구원). 22 A recent work published in cooperation between the Institut d'études coréennes (IEC) of the Collège de France and the University of Pusan presents the correspondance. Cf. Maurice Courant, Une amitié pour la Corée. « Cher Monsieur Collin de Plancy » (A friendship for Korea. "Dear Mister Collin de Plancy"), Kalp'i 2, 2017, 274 pages. The long and well-documented article about Courant by Bouchez (see above note 14) has been republished in this volume.

  « The Great Ming Code and the Repression of Catholics in Chosŏn Korea », Acta Koreana, vol. 15, n°1, juin 2012, p. 73-106 ; « Chosŏn kagyo ŭi chaebalgyŏn : 16-19 segi ch'ŏnjugyo sŏn'gyosa ŭi Chosŏn chinch'ul chŏllyak e taehan kich'o yŏn'gu (The Rediscovery of the Korean Bridge : A Preliminary Study of the Catholic Missionaries' Strategies regarding Korea, 16 th -19 th Century) », Yŏnmin Hakchi, vol. 16, août 2011, p. 189-233. For a more detailed CV and bibliography of Roux, see http://cecmc.ehess.fr/index.php?2480.

Paris Sciences et Lettres (PSL Research University) that gathers, for Korean studies, the colleagues from the EHESS, Collège de France, and French School of Asian Studies (Ecole Française d'Extrême-Orient EFEO).

The fourth place of pre-modern Korean studies is the Seoul Centre of the EFEO, with Elisabeth Chabanol 43 who has been conducting for almost fifteen years ground-breaking archeological research in Kaesŏng, in collaboration with the National Bureau of Cultural Property Conservation of the DPRK. 44 Beside these four higher education institutions, one should notice the role still played by the Guimet Museum in Korean studies. There are two specialists of Korean pre-modern art who have been occupying permanent positions there, working frequently with Koreanists: Francis Macouin who has recently published an introductory book about Chosŏn Korea 45 and Pierre Cambon who published several articles about Korean pre-modern art and has been often meeting the demand coming from the general public. 46 The library funds available for pre-modern studies are located at the respective libraries of Paris Diderot University, INALCO, 47 EHESS, EFEO, and Guimet Museum. But the richest library is located at the Collège de France, 48 in the Institut d'études coréennes (IEC). 49 The cardinale de l'interprétation coréenne du néo-confucianisme. Etude centrée sur Yulgok, Yi I (1536-1584)" (Chongsim ('straightening one's heart') : one of the central ideas of the Korean interpretation of Neoconfucianism). She was a Korea Foundation post-doctoral fellow at the Korea Institute at Harvard University and the research assistant (attaché temporaire d'enseignement et de recherche ATER) of Anne Cheng, professor of Chinese Intellectual History at the Collège de France. For more inforation about Isabelle Sancho, see http://crc.ehess.fr/index.php?193. 43 The EFEO (프랑스국립극동연구원) has a branch office in Seoul, called The Seoul Centre. This centre was established by Bertrand Chung in 1994 at the Asian Research Institute of the Korea University (고려대학교 아세아문제 연구소). In 2001 Elisabeth Chabanol, an archeologist and specialist of East Asian art history, was recruited at the EFEO and has been acting as the head of the centre since 2002. 44 Mission Archéologique à Kaesŏng (MAK). A catalogue about the exhibition presenting the results of this archeological research carried out until 2014 by the EFEO and the National Authority for the Protection of Cultural Heritage (NAPCH) in DPRK has been published in 2017. The exhibition was held from September 15 to November 30 in Pyongyang (조선 민속 박물관) and in September 2017 in Kaesong (고려 박물관). Cf. La forteresse de Kaesong. Catalogue de l'exposition sur les recherches archéologiques conjointes de la forteresse de Kaesong (조선-프랑스 개성성공동조사발굴), Collection Essais, L'Atelier des Cahiers, november 2017. 45 Macouin is a now retired chief curator at the Guimet Museum. He is an honorary associate member of the CRC and a member of the AFPEC. Cf. Francis Macouin, La Corée du Chosŏn. 1392-1896 (Chosŏn Korea. 1892-1896), Guide Belles lettres des civilisations, Les Belles Lettres, Paris, 2009. See also, Francis Macouin (dir.), Études d'architecture et d'urbanisme coréens, Paris, Collège de France, 1994, 262 pages and pictures. 46 Pierre Cambon (born 1955), chief curator and manager of the Korean collection at the Guimet Museum, also works closely with a few members of the CRC without being formally an associate of the center. 47 The library of the INALCO is called BULAC. See http://www.bulac.fr/bulac-in-english/who-are-we/. 48 This most prestigious research establishement, firstly called Collège Royal (Royal College), was created in 1530 in a humanist inspiration by king Francis 1 of France. Renamed Collège de France in 1870, it is composed and managed today by a faculty of about fifty professors, elected by the professors themselves. The Collège de


Isabelle Sancho

Workshop on Yulgok Studies Yulgok Studies and Korean Culture 율곡학과 한국 문화

Yulgok's view on

wrote in 1580, in his early forties, the Veritable Records on Kija (Kija silgi 箕子實記). This short text is quite famous, for it has been commonly cited as an illustration of the special emphasis put on the figure of Kija 箕子 (Jizi in Chinese) in Chosŏn Korea by the State as well as the Neo-Confucian literati. The legend of Kija, taken as a bridge linking China and Korea since Antiquity, was often taken as a means to secure Chosŏn's political and philosophical legitimacy and to claim its priviledged position within the Sino-centric world order.

The Vicount of Ji, personal name Xu Yu 胥余, was an uncle of King Zhou 紂, the bad last ruler of the Shang dynasty (7th to 11th cent. BCE). He is known as one of the "three wise men" (samhyŏn 三賢) of Shang, along with Weizi 微子 and Bigan 比干. He occupied the position of Grand Preceptor (taesa 太師) before being imprisonned after remonstrating against the misrule of the corrupt king (or, according to one variant, after pretending to be a madman when king Zhou tortured to death Bigan). After the fall of the Shang dynasty that he had predicted, he transmitted to King Wu of , who overthrew the evil king of Shang, the forgotten secret of Yu the Great, the Hongfan/Hongbŏm 洪範 later recorded in the Book of Documents. But he refused to serve the new ruler and decided to take the road of exile. Some Chinese sources (all post-Qin dynasty documents providing no historical evidences) added that he went eastwards to the Korean peninsula with no less than 5000 people, among whom many craftsmen. He would then have been enfeoffed by King Wu in P'yŏngyang area, where he founded a state known as Chosŏn (Kija Chosŏn). During his rule, he transformed and "civilized" the primitive people (i 夷) living in the peninsula. As for

Korean sources, such as the Memorabilia of the Three Kingdoms (Samguk yusa 三國遺事, late 13 th century) and the Songs of Emperors and kings (Chewang un'gi 帝王韻紀, 1287), a rhymed chrolonogy of Chinese and Korean rulers written by Yi Sŭnghyu 李承休 (1214-1259), they took for granted that Kija succeded to the mythical progenitor of Korean people, Tangun 檀君, who had previously ruled over a territory called Old Chosŏn (Ko Chosŏn).

So based on a few historical and apocryphical documents, Kija has been regarded as the cultural heroe who brought proper civilization in the Korean peninsula, by introducing basic laws (the Hongbŏm kuju 洪範九疇), morals, agricultural techniques, rituals, music, and administrative structure. An official worship was rendered to him in Koguryŏ and then in Koryŏ, but also in China. Indeed, from commentary to commentary, the fief and gravesite of Kija happened to be located in various places in China as well (going from Henan, Hebei, Shanxi, to Liaoning). In Korea, king Sukchong 肅宗 of Koryŏ (r. 1095Koryŏ (r. -1105) ) identified a mound at the village of Kirim (Kirimni 箕林里) near P'yŏngyang as Kija's gravesite and built a mausoleum to enshrine him in 1102 (Kija chŏn 箕⼦殿 /Sungin chŏn 崇仁殿).

Today, most of South and North Koreans do not know who Kija is and what importance he used to have in pre-modern Korea. Tangun stole the spotlight from Kija as the founder of the Korean nation and culture, when the modern historiography that was struggling with challenging theories of colonialism, imperialism and nationalism started to reshuffle the cards. It has been decades now that Kija disappeared from history textbooks. The main reason is that, according to some scholars from the late 19 th and early 20 th centuries, the legend of Kija gave birth to the so-called theory of "Kija's Easterly Migration" (箕⼦東來說), notably illustrated by Chang Chiyŏn 張志淵 in his seminal 朝鮮儒教淵源. Later, in the 20 th century, this theory has been commonly associated with several "hot potatoes" in Korean historiography, such as the Sino-barbarian dichotomy (or the distinction between Hua 華 and Yi 夷/華夷論) and the theory of the "Small China" (小中華 also called "little Sino-Centrism" or "little Central Efflorescence"). These two controversial issues, both closely related to Korea's positioning in relation to China and the hegemony of Chinese culture (中 華), are still the focus of most of the studies dedicated today in academia to Kija and especially Yulgok's Kija silgi.

However this approach of the Kija silgi emerged in fact rather lately even in pre-modern time.

It emerged during the second half of the Chosŏn dynasty when scholars (especially the Noron faction steming from Yulgok's followers) attempted from the 17 th century onwards to reject the political and cultural supremacy of Qing China -that is to say the Manchu dynasty-. This paper will briefly analyze the Kija silgi taken as itself but also as compared with several other texts written by Yulgok on Kija and collected in the Yulgok chŏnsŏ. The aim is to better understand what the Kija silgi means within Yulgok's work and thus to try to shed a new light on Yulgok's view on Kija.

The Kija silgi raises interesting questions about its content but also its form, an aspect that has been repeatedly neglected in previous studies. The genre to which it belongs is rather unclear. As explained by Yulgok himself, it was written to summarize the Kija chi 箕子志 ("Records on Kija") published by Yun Tusu 尹斗壽 (1533-1601) when the latter came back from a diplomatic mission to China in 1577. Yun Tusu had been asked about what Kija became when he settled in Korea at the Chinese court and failed to answer properly. He thus decided to compile all available information related to Kija in the Classics and various historical writings. But Yulgok found his text not well organized and was afraid that the reader may be lost about the essentials. Hence he wrote his own account of Kija in the interests of clarity and called it silgi 實記 in which ki 記 may be translated by "notes" or "records." By its form and content, the text reminds of the "random jottings" or "brush notes" (the Chinese biji 筆記) and, within the polymorphous genre of biji, the zhiren 志人 ("Accounts/Records of famous personalities"). Mixing prose narrative with rhymed passages, it can be roughly divided into 3 parts: a summary of Kija's life and deeds -with an equal attention paid to what he did in China and in Korea-, followed by a rather long and vibrant song of praise, and wrapped up by Yulgok's personal opinion. So the Kija silgi is not a work of a historian investigating into source materials, even though Yulgok is careful with historical evidences as shown by his statement about the uncertainty surrounding Tangun's historical testimony. It is not either a political or philosophical treatise with a clear ideological agenda. The Kija silgi is basically a personnal and circumstancial account of Yun Tusu's compilation made by Yulgok who has reached important political recognition and achieved a certain intellectual maturity in 1580. It is also a concise summary primarily meant to be circulated informally/unofficially to inculcate more people with the history of Kija.

As for the content of the Kija silgi, it can be summed up as follows. Kija was the founder of the Kingly Way (wangdo 王道) in Korea, or Korea was the land where the Kingly Way was achieved "for real" by Kija (wangdo silhyŏn 王道實現). But a closer look at the text shows that Kija is in fact more than that. Labelled as the "first Sage" (wŏnsŏng 元聖), he represents the starting point of the two civilized states under heaven: China and Korea. These original states are characterized by Yulgok by their happening at the very beginning of the "historical time," that is to say the time of the Three kings (samwang 三王:Yu the great, Tang, and kings Wen and Wu taken as one). These kings succeeded to the Five emperors (oje 五帝: Fu Xi, Shennong, Huangdi, Yao, and Shun) from "mythical time" and were hence the last practitioners of the Kingly Way under heaven. The reason why Kija was the common ancestor of the two historical cases where the Kingly Way was truly put into practice before disapearing (in China and Korea), is that Kija gave to king Wu the Great Plan before leaving deliberately for the Korean peninsula where he applied himself the principles of that Plan.

An interesting feature of Yulgok's discourse is that Kija was a man of in 仁 who chose to "flee" the new dynasty founded by brutal force and create his own state (kuk 國) eastwards.

This state was shaped with affection and benevolence, and the Korean land has been progressively infused with the civilizing effects of the Kingly Way. The main features stressed by Yulgok are rites and ethics -"Confucian" rites and ethics before the advent of Confucius himself, so to speak. In the rather long and precise description of the history of the Ki family's rule in Korea, Yulgok contrasts the peacefulness and ethical practices of Korean people with the instability, violence and guile of Chinese people of the period beginning with the Warring States. Moreover the hazards and final collapse of Ki family's successive kingdoms (Kija Chosŏn and Mahan 馬韓) were all due to the chaos generated repeatedly by the troubled Chinese history. To sum up, China had put an end to the sage rule of the House of Ki in Korea that lasted for about 1120 years. The Kija silgi not only gives a precise starting point to the first state ever applying the Kingly Way under heaven (Kija Chosŏn) but it also inscribes it in a precise -and rather lengthy-period of time. According to Yulgok who follows Yun Tusu on this matter, Kija descendants amounted for 41 generations, which goes against Mencius' statement about the "5 generations" (i.e. both the exemplary person and the petty person wane after 5 generations).

All this can easily explain why Yulgok's Kija silgi used to be considered as the perfect illustration of the "Small China" theory adopted by some late Chosŏn scholars-officials.

However when the Kija silgi is compared with other texts written by Yulgok at different ages and under different circumstances, this conclusion is somehow blurred.

Yulgok have discussed about the "Kingly Way" in several texts, among which the wellknown Outline of the Sagely Learning/ Sŏnghak chipyo 聖學輯要 (1575) and the Questions and Answers from the Eastern Lake/ Tongho mundap 東湖問答 (1569). This text in particular, written during a monthly assessment and submitted to the young king Sŏnjo by Yulgok when he was on sabbatical leave (saga toksŏ 賜暇讀書) at the Reading House at the Eastern Lake (Tongho Toksŏdang 東湖讀書堂), is particularly interesting. The reason is that 11 years before writing the Kija silgi, Yulgok gave a much more pessimistic view on Korean ancient history. The text does say as well that Kija has transformed the barbaric people living in the peninsula and has duly transmitted the special teaching he received from Yu the great directly inspired by Heaven. But the text further says that the Learning of the Way (道學) had never been practized by any ruler and had never been properly understood by any scholar after Kija in Korea (tongbang chi to pul haeng 東方道學不行). This pessimistic diagnosis was also applied to Chinese history by Yulgok, in a slightly different way: after the Three dynasties (Xia, Shang, Zhou), the Kingly Way was no longer practised (wangdo pul haeng 王 道不行), because the Learning of the Way was no longer shining (tohak pul myŏng 道學不明 ). To sum up, nothing positive related to the Kingly Way happened in China after the death of the Duke of Zhou (周公), revered by Confucius. But contrary to Korea, there were real scholars in China who transmitted the Learning of the Way (the Neo-Confucians). So in the Tongho mundap, Kija does not seem to stand out particularly at first sight. But he is characterized as setting the single historical precedent of the practise of the Kingly Way in Korean history. As for Tangun, he is cautiously dismissed because of the lack of relevant historical materials.

Beside the Tongho mundap, which is a polemical essay and a true exercise in style, one should note that Yulgok wrote over a period of 14 years (from 1568 to 1582) several poetic pieces where he alluded to Kija: four poems about Kija's tomb and mausoleum (Kija chŏn 箕⼦殿, Kija myo isu 箕⼦廟⼆⾸, al Kija myo pu 謁箕⼦廟賦), and one additional poem to the rhapsody on Kija composed by vice-emissary Wang Jingmin 王敬民 (fl. 1584) (ch'a Wang ch'ŏnsa [Mingyŏng] Kija myo puun 次王天使民敬箕⼦廟賦韻). These poems remind us of one very common feature of the early Chosŏn diplomatic relationships between Korea and China: the poetry contests between Chinese and Korean emissaries that were an integral part of the diplomatic practices through wich each party could expose their political views in veiled terms. Among the literary topoi of these poems compiled in the successive anthologies of "Envoy poetry" called Anthology of Brilliant Flowers (hwanghwa chip 皇華集) from China that circulated in Korea, there are the two former capitals laid on the diplomatic road connecting Beijing and Hanyang: Kaesŏng, where the residence welcoming the Chinese emissaries (T'aep'yŏnggwan 太平館) was located; and P'yŏngyang, where Kija's mausoleum and temple were located. One poem recorded in this anthology is that of Sŏ Kŏjŏng 徐居正 (1410-1488) who wrote about Kija's mausoleum at the end of the 15 th century. So it is no surprise that Kija was a common literary theme for diplomatic exchanges and, in that sense, Yulgok was not an exception while composing poems on that important figure.

CONCLUSION

To conclude this brief survey that I would like to deepen in the future, I would like to make a couple of tentative remarks.

-Taken as a single text isolated from other Yulgok's writings, the Kija silgi lends itself easily to the common reading saying that it is a vivid example of the Korean claim to be equal to China in terms of civilization and Confucianism. In that sense, it can be considered as a writing among so many others from the early Chosŏn period that highlighted the importance of Kija in Korean history (examples: texts written by big names like Chŏng Tojŏn, Kwŏn Kŭn, Sŏ Kŏjŏng, but also Yi Hwang, etc.). In such a standpoint, the originality and fame of the Kija silgi would solely lie in its formal -i.e. synthetical and didactical-aspect and its rather "handy" format.

-However, when the Kija silgi is put into perspective with other types of writings within the Yulgok chŏnsŏ, it turns out that it illustrates the breaks and continuities in Yulgok's perception of Kija. Written quite lately by Yulgok under specific circumstances (Yun Tusu just wrote his Kija chi and Chinese emissaries were repeatedly inquiring about Kija), the Kija silgi stands for instance in sharp contrast with the Tongho mundap. In the Kija silgi, Kija's royal House is inscribed in the long run (longue durée) of Korean history. On the contrary, in the Tongho mundap written by the young Yulgok eager to teach and remonstrate the king, Kija is synonymous with one single episode of real practising of the Kingly Way in Korea in remote antiquity that was unfortunately never repeated again (he is an événement). As for the commonality of Yulgok's writings about Kija, it lies in the complex mixing of a strong "historicity" associated with Kija on the one hand (the story of Kija is true), and the literary and intellectual nostalgia for a world that seems lost for ever on the other hand.

-So one should try to see beyond the problematic of the Small China when reflecting on Yulgok's view on Kija. In Yulgok's writings taken as a whole, Kija can indeed be considered as a true philosophical impetus (a difficult but precious incentive) addressed to Korean kings and scholars-officials in order to pursue the Kingly Way and the Transmission of the Way in Korea. In that sense, Kija is more than a convenient "tool" used for political, ideological, and diplomatical purposes; it rather stands for a glimmer of hope in the dark picture usually drawn by Yulgok about his own time.

-Moreover, instead of applying a teleological view on the historical significance and role of the Kija silgi, it could be fruitful to study further the very theme of Kija within Yulgok's various writings. In order to do so, more attention could be also paid to the literary, stylistic, and formal aspects of his texts when analyzing their philosophical and historical meanings.


Monday

better known as Hwadam 花潭, the "Florid pool", after the name of his life-long place of residence in Songdo 松 都 (today's Kaesŏng 開城) in the northern part of the Korean peninsula. Even though he was not enshrined during the Chosŏn period in the Munmyo 文廟 (the official Confucian Shrine), his intellectual legacy is highly praised in modern scholarship in both South and North Korea, which makes him a notable exception.

In modern scholarship, Hwadam has often been defined by his supposedly single focus on the notion of Vital Energy/ Ki 氣 , also called Ki monism (chugiron 主氣論 or kiilwŏllon 氣一元論). The dominant historical narrative about Korean Neo-Confucianism, still heavily relying on the scholarship from the Japanese colonial period, tends to highlight a handful of debates to characterize the premodern Korean Confucian tradition. Generally speaking, these debates have been described as focusing on either the supremacy of the Vital Energy, or the Patterning Principle, or both. The most famous debate has been called the "Theories on the Four Sprouts and the Seven Emotions," sadan ch'ilchŏngnon 四端七情論. It opposed, in the 16 th century, major scholars, such as Kobong, Ki Taesŭng 奇大升 (1527-72) and T'oegye, Yi

Hwang 李滉 (1501-1570), but also Yulgok, Yi I 李珥 (1536-1584) and Ugye, Sŏng

Hon 成渾 (1535-1598). This debate has often been pinpointed as the apex of the Korean speculations on Neo-Confucianism and has been studied ad nauseam. In this broad modern narrative of Korean Confucianism, Hwadam's cosmological reflections are believed to have influenced the big names of the 16 th century who took part in this Four/Seven debate and who stand today as the icons of Korean philosophy. So many studies devoted so far to Hwadam's thoughts have been attempts to trace the genealogy of the Korean Ki school in the early Chosŏn period.

Moreover, Hwadam's independent stance regarding the orthodox Cheng/Zhu school (called Chujahak 朱子學 in Korea), which, as you know, is commonly considered the state ideology of the Chosŏn dynasty, has been more than once extensively highlighted. The reason for this is that his free-spirited attitude was taken as a precedent explaining the later flourishing of the "non-orthodox" tendencies of the late Chosŏn period, collectively labeled, for ideological purposes, Practical Learning/sirhak 實學. Demonstrating the existence of a non-orthodox, or in other words a "non-Zhuxist," intellectual thread, running from the early to the end of Chosŏn, was indeed crucial for modern Koreans at the turn of the 20 th century and afterwards. By doing so, they were trying to overthrow the Japanese colonial diagnosis of the historical failure and missed modernity of Korea, epitomized by its blind adherance to Neo-Confucianism, which was easily confused with rigid orthodoxy.

In South Korea, Sŏ Kyŏngdŏk has been cited in nearly all the general studies on At another level, Sŏ Kyŏngdŏk has played a significant role in the collective mind of Korean society, past and present. He is regarded as an embodiment of the sallim 山林, the rusticated scholar who remains hidden in "mountains and forests," far from political life. His repeated refusal to serve within the bureaucracy paints the picture of an independent spirit, drawn to erudite seclusion. Contemporary scholars have attributed this attitude to the context of the troubled times of early Chosŏn history, in which no less than five "literati purges" (sahwa 士禍) targeted Neo-Confucian scholars-officials over a short period of fifty years (1498,1504,1519,1545). Because of this attitude of deliberate withdrawal and the testimony of a life dedicated to learning far from the circles of power, Sŏ Kyŏngdŏk makes his appearance as a hero in popular novels from the mid-Chosŏn period, where he is depicted as a Daoist master with magical powers or even immortal. In the yadam 野談 (oral tales) he is given the gift of prophecy and cast as the savior of the people, thanks to his expertise in the Book of Changes and his mastery of occult arts. Hwadam's wisdom is highlighted in several stories focusing on his relationship with women. Legend has it that Hwadam remained immune to the enchantment of Hwang Chini 黃眞伊 (c.1506-c.1560), the most famous kisaeng in Korean history who was a native of Kaesŏng and was involved in the same social scene as Hwadam. This is how Hwadam's character has regularly featured in successful South

Korean movies and dramas focusing on the life of Hwang Chini.

If Hwadam is a famous name, known by all in today's Korea and associated with the The criteria used to establish those intellectual lineages of the Korean Tot'ong/Daotong were extremely complex and, of course, changed over time. But one might say that there were two major (or ideal) criteria. The first one was the philosophical orientation of a scholar's teachings. For instance, it is well known that any obvious sign of infatuation with Buddhism, Daoism, Wang Yangming or Ming scholarship was held as suspect. A second criterion was revolving around the moral teaching that may, or may not, be drawn from a scholar's life. What we call Confucians in Chosŏn period were all, with very few exceptions, members of the same elite group, whose social legitimacy strictly derived from their way of leading the proper life that was expected from a member of the elite : either studying and teaching, or serving in the bureaucracy. As members of the ruling elites, they His legacy lied in his reputation of being a knowledgeable and upright man.

One reason why the details of his thoughs were not known well might be that Hwadam did not write any works of synthesis, no extensive commentaries on the Classics or the Four books, nor any well-crafted treatises like some of his fellow Neo-Confucian literati. When he realized that his days were numbered, he only dictated a set of four texts to clarify his position regarding a few subjects related to cosmology that were discussed in his circles. To some extent, his surviving writings may be described as short (even dry) scholarly explanations and circumstantial pieces. Hwadam's intellectual legacy was firstly made available for proper scrutiny when his collected writings (munjip) were compiled by his direct disciples in the late 16 th century. A serious investigation into Hwadam's thoughts was made possible only starting from the 17 th century onwards, when the scholars of the Kaesŏng and Hanyang areas dedicated lots of energy, human and material resources, in order to try to turn him into a true Confucian master, worthy of taking part in the Korean Daotong, by printing his munjip. But the task of Hwadam's supporters was rather difficult. It is true that in the early 17 th century, the Hwagok academy where sacrifices were performed for "Master Hwadam" (Hwadam sŏnsaeng 花潭先生), had already been granted a royal charter and a special tombstone under royal order (sindobi 神道碑) and Hwadam bestowed posthumous titles as well. But in the end, Sŏ Kyŏngdŏk could never enter the Munmyo and he was never acknowledged as a true Confucian master.

The main reason why did not succeed to gain the status of a major scholar during the Chosŏn period is mainly due to his cosmology based on the exegesis of the When looking at the Hwadam chip, it cannot be denied that Hwadam, sometimes called the Shao Yong of Korea, was explicitely relying upon Shao Yong's approach of the Changes. Shao Yong was the embodiment of the school of "figures and numbers" (xiangshu/sangsu 象數), which was considered less orthodox than the school of "meanings and principles" (yili/ŭiri 義理) represented by Zhang Zai, Cheng Yi and Zhu Xi. Among the 22 texts of prose contained in the Hwadam chip, one can easily notice that there are 2 memorials, 5 letters, 2 inscriptions on zither, 2 short statements, and 13 miscellanies. These miscellanies mainly deal with cosmology, with the exception of the 2 statements about his disciples' names at the very end. Moreover, 4 out of these 13 texts (in light red on the slide) are random comments on Shao Yong's cosmochrony and phonology.

In order to tackle the problem posed by this heavy influence of Shao Yong on Hwadam, his supporters employed 2 different strategies. The first one was to show that, contrary to common knowledge, Hwadam's cosmology was in line with the orthodoxy. When compiling Hwadam's munjip, they notably placed at the very beginnning of the miscellanies part the four texts that Hwadam dictated to Hŏ Yŏp 許曄 (1517-1580) on his death bed. Even though these texts should be placed at the last place in a chronological order, they were placed first, certainly in order to be presented as the real testimony of Hwadam. The main characteristic of these texts is that they are closer to Zhang Zai' views than Shao Yong's ones.

Their writing style also contrasts with that of the miscellanies texts dealing with Shao Yong's philosophy. One might even argue that they were slightly edited and improved by Hwadam's disciples in the process of the munjip compilation.

The second strategy employed by Hwadam's supporters was to highlight Hwadam's biography. One very striking feature of Hwadam's life is that he was a self-taught man. He had no known master and taught himself through reading books on his own. He was not the offspring of a prominent or rich noble family, but his mother is described as having great expectations for him (actually, she dreamt of entering the Munmyo herself the night Hwadam was conceived). So Hwadam must have been provided in his youth with all the books needed to prepare for the civil service examinations, among which a copy of the Xingli Daquan. But instead of preparing the examinations, his biography describes a rather tortured soul, spending nights and days in his room to investigate into all things between heaven and earth.

The two above mentionned strategies employed by Hwadam supporters in the 18 th century can be seen in one of the postfaces of the Hwadam chip, the one written by Yun Tŭkkwan 尹得觀 :

[…] Among our Eastern scholars, both masters Chŏngam [Cho Kwangjo] and T'oegye [Yi Hwang] could be considered the best. But master Sŏ Hwadam was born between the two. The explanations given by each of the three masters about the Patterning Principle and Vital Energy contain truths and untruths when compared one to another. This was discussed by Yulgok [Yi I], venerable Munsŏng, who only retained the master and Chŏngam because they achieved understanding on their own. There is most certainly an expression of praise implied in such an opinion. [Yun Kŭnsu 尹根壽 (1537-1616), the founder of the Southerners and disciple of T'oegye] was sent on a mission to the celestial court. When the scholars of the Chinese court asked him whether Kija [Qizi]'s divisions and his science of numbers, as well as Confucius and Mencius' method of the mind, had been transmitted in our country, naming the master along with Chŏngam and other sages, he answered: "A certain Sŏ has clearly explained the Learning of Nature and Principle, and he's even more well-versed in numerology." This took place at a time when the tenure of explanations conformed to T'oegye's views. But later on, T'oegye himself was very lenient with the master, as can be seen in the views he expressed in his poetry. So, average Confucians have sometimes accused the master's scholarship, in order to belittle it, of excessive bias towards numbers, but this is ignorance.

My forefather the Marquis Wŏljŏng

Numbers are patterning principles. To choose to learn without knowing the Patterning Principle, can this truly be called Learning? Master Confucius' commentaries provided the Changes with their coherence: so this is the same when dealing with numbers. Supposing that Confucius had never worked on editing the Odes or focusing on the Rites, and that only his commentaries on the Changes had been transmitted, would it be even thinkable to belittle the Master himself by criticizing him for studying numbers?

Early in his life master Sŏ meditated for one full year. Afterwards he was able to immediately and naturally comprehend all things, and thereupon he became aware that what is written in books could also be fathomed through thinking alone. He then wrote on his walls the names of all things and beings between heaven and earth, and could not eat or sleep for thinking, until he finally understood the unity pervading all things. Zhu Xi used to say that whoever wants to really learn must beforehand understand the meaning of words and after that, depending on this preliminary work, one might be able to seek the underlying patterning principles. When considering the master, this is indeed the case. The texts of the present compilation, "Upstream to the source of the Patterning Principle and Vital Energy" and so forth, are all expressions of this comprehension of his through thinking alone. […] As can be seen in the first paragraph quoted above, assessing a scholar's position within the tradition in Choson period consisted in situating him into a specific lineage, a specific line of chronological succession. Hwadam was a tricky case, for he was a self-taught scholar. Also, he quite unexpectedly became an influent master, thanks to his moral stature and not thanks to his political network. Moreover, his specific interest for Shao Yong was But Hwadam's supporters did something even more efficient. They linked him to the major icon of the sarim scholars, Cho Kwangjo, the leader of the Tohak Neo-Confucians who was the main target of the 1519 purge under Chungjong's reign. That same year, Hwadam was selected for appointement but refused to take any position. Kim An'guk, who was Hwadam's supporter during his lifetime and officially recommended him for a position, was a friend of Cho Kwangjo. He studied with him under Kim Koengp'il 金宏弼 (1454-1504), the great scholar against whom the 1504 purge was launched. To sum up, through the patronage he received from Kim Ang'uk, Hwadam could be linked as well to the most prestigious lineage for any orthodox Confucians in late Chosŏn period: that of Kim Koengp'il-Cho Kwangjo.

Hwadam's case is a good place to start in understanding how the nature of the expertise of the Changes could have heavily impacted the credentials and legitimacy that were given to Confucian scholars within the Korean tradition in the course of the Chosŏn dynasty. It is true that, generally speaking, the line is drawn, between the Cheng/Zhu school and other streams of Song Confucianism, around the problem of self-cultivation and the socalled Learning of the mind in Neo-Confucianism. That is the reason why Korean orthodoxy has been commonly defined as stubbornly standing against Buddhism and the school of Wang Yangming. But there is another line, a much sutble one, that would deserve further attention.

It is the one revolving around the different understandings of the Changes.

  of the Changes and the definition of the orthodox Confucian tradition in Chosŏn Korea » Sŏ Kyŏngdŏk 徐敬德 (1489-1546) is a well-known figure of Chosŏn Korea. He is

  cheerful and positive figure of a wise man, things were slightly more complex in premodern times. Hwadam's thoughts and character became a matter of interest only two decades after his death, when discussions were trigerred under Sŏnjo's reign (1567-1608), at court and among Confucian circles throughout the country, about the place he should be given within the Korean Confucian tradition. The late 16 th century was a pivotal time in the history of Korean Confucianism. It was a transition from a time marked by bloody purges targetting Tohak/Daoxue and sarim scholars (that is to say, stricly speaking, Neo-Confucians), to a long era from the 17 th to the 19 th century marked by massive factional strives, launched by almost all Confucian factions against each other. These factional struggles, which involved raging intellectual and political disputes among different schools, resulted in a dire need of definition of the Korean orthodoxy, in a broader regional context in which China was no longer the center of civilization after the Imjin War that reshuffled the cards of the balance of powers in East Asia. But, to be strictly accurate, attempts to define the To'tong/Daotong in Korea had been made well before the great war. They had been mainly initiated by the two major scholars who were active in the pre-Imjin period, T'oegye, Yi Hwang and Yulgok, Yi I, who both established the main lineages of Korean orthodoxy.

Changes.

  Hwadam was not held in high regard by the leading Neo-Confucians of the middle of the Chosŏn dynasty, for these scholars were sticking to the lukewarm assessments made by previous scholars in the 16 th century. These 16 th century scholars, who were the forefathers of the diverse "schools"(hakp'a/xuepai) that were later influential and fighting one another in the 17 th and 18 th centuries, used to denigrate Hwadam as a mediocre Confucian thinker, an insignificant specialist of numerology. Reducing his thoughts as worthless divination techniques, they denied him any substantial role within early Chosŏn Confucianism. Because the texts Hwadam left behind were piecemeal, mostly painting the picture of a follower of the Northern Song scholars such as Zhou Dunyi, Zhang Zai, and especially Shao Yong, Hwadam was not considered a true follower of the Cheng/Zhu school. Hence he was not worthy of being included into the Korean Tot'ong/Datong.

  unusual and disturbing, to say the least. But, since he was an important figure in Kaesŏng, an easy way out of the problem was to affiliate him in the lineage of the other great figure of the area: Chŏng Mongju 鄭夢周 (1337-1392). Chŏng Mongju was the iconic figure of the loyal minister who remained faithful to the previous dynasty and killed at the Koryŏ/Chosŏn transition. He was praised by the sarim scholars of the 16 th century who were persecuted during the successive literati purges. Chŏng Mongju was a disciple of U Kilsaeng 禹吉生 (dates unknwon), who was himself the son of Yŏktong 易東, U T'ak 禹倬 ( 1263-1342), the first great Korean specialist of the Changes and Neo-Confucianism. So, through his geographical/Kaesŏng connexion to Chŏng Mongju, Hwadam could be artificially linked to U T'ak and the very origins of the reception of Neo-Confucianism in Koryŏ. Claiming that he was a legitimate Neo-Confucian scholar could then become more acceptable.

  were banned from working with their hands or practising trading. Assessing a scholar's life basically meant assessing his committment to practicing and propagating Confucianism.So what happened when the late 16 th century scholars started to assess Hwadam's place in Korean Confucianism ? Contrary to what Hwadam liked to portray himself, he was not an obscure hermit. During his lifetime, he was an influential local personality from the Kaesŏng area, close to the capital and the royal court. He interacted with the major intellectual circles of his time, as is testified by his two appointments proposed by Kim An'guk 金安國 (1478-1543), the leader of the sarim scholars under Chungjong's reign(1506- 1544). Hwadam met scholars and poets, such as Sŏng Un 成運 (1497-1579) and Cho Sik 曹植 (1501-1572). He taught and fostered many disciples, some of whom became powerful high officials or respected scholars under Sŏnjo's reign. Many of these disciples were famous for their mastery of the Book of Changes, as, for instance, Pak Sun 朴淳 (1523-

1589), Hŏ Yŏp 許曄 (1517-1580), Yi Chiham 李之菡 (1517-1578), Kim Hyeson 金惠孫 (dead 1585), Ma Hŭigyŏng 馬羲慶 (1525-1589), Sin Yŏk 申㴒 (dates unknown), and Chang Kasun 張可順 (1493-1549). Despite this indisputable fame, surprinsingly enough, Hwadam's thoughts were not known in details in that time and his writings were not widely circulated.