Wrongful Deaths

This collection presents and analyzes inquest records that tell the stories of ordinary Korean people under the Choson court (1392-1910). Extending the study of this period, usually limited to elites, into the realm of everyday life, each inquest record includes a detailed postmortem examination and features testimony from everyone directly or indirectly related to the incident. The result is an amazingly vivid, colloquial account of the vibrant, multifaceted sociocultural and legal culture of early modern Korea.

Sun Joo Kim is the Harvard-Yenching Professor of Korean History at Harvard University. Jungwon Kim is assistant professor of Korean history at Columbia University.

Acknowledgments

Translators’ Notes

Map of Nineteenth-century Korea

Introduction Choson Korea in Its Last Century

Case 1 An Adulterous Widower Meets a Violent Death

Yang Hang-nyon (P’yongyang, P’yongan Province, 1866)

Case 2 A Family Activist Confronts a Local Magnate

Ms. Pak (Yongin, Kyonggi Province, Late Eighteenth Century)

Case 3 A Defiant Slave Challenges His Master with Death

Yi Pong-dol (Anui, Kyongsang Province, 1842)

Case 4 Two Widows Fight

Madam Chang and Ms. Un (Yech’on, Kyongsang Province, 1842)

Case 5 A Heartless Wet Nurse Abuses an Infant

Mun Chong-ji (Chunghwa, P’yongan Province, 1866)

Case 6 A Widower Seeks Private Settlement

Ms. Chong (Yongch’on, Kyongsang Province, 1889)

Case 7 Adultery Leads to Murder

Ms. Paek (Anak, Hwanghae Province, 1897)

Case 8 An Illegal Burial Begets a Son but Kills a Relative

Kim Kap-san (Hoeyang, Kangwŏn Province, 1899)

Notes

Glossary

Bibliography

Index