The Marmot’s Hole

For those interested, the MBC historical drama Sindon will begin on Sept. 24. Sindon tells the tale of, well, Sindon, a Buddhist monk who would rise to power toward the end of the Koryo kingdom. From the Korean History Project:

King Kongmin chose an obscure Buddhist monk to administer his reform program, a man with no connections to either the military or the powerful families. P’yonjo, whose name later changed to Sin Ton, not only held the government’s highest clerical post, but had the requisite power and authority necessary to carry out the reform process. The appointment may have been made to make reform work with less conflict, but Sin Ton went about his work with far too much vigor. He soon instituted a wholesale reorganization and reestablishment of royal authority and bureaucratic government. With Kongmin’s consent, Sin Ton created a special agency for land reform and placed himself at its head. He then proceeded to return lands and slaves seized by the powerful families to their original owners and in many cases actually set slaves free. It did not take long for Sin Ton’s actions to become the target of aristocratic landlords who saw him as a direct threat to their power and wealth.

A minority class of large landowners, deposed aristocrats and military officials who greatly benefited from the Mongol presence in Koryo were not at all pleased by the Mongols’ departure. Upset over their future prospects without Mongol support, they joined to form the core of a strong, conservative faction opposed to reforms. The focus of the pro-Mongol faction’s anger was King Kongmin’s reform leader, Sin Ton. In 1371, under a cloud of trumped up charges that he wasted state funds on Buddhist ceremonies, they orchestrated his banishment from government. Soon after removing the Buddhist monk from office, Sin Ton’s opponents quietly murdered him.

Interestingly enough, he tried to convince the king to move the capital from Kaesong to Chungju in Chungcheong Province, citing feng shui. Silly him — he should have cited balanced regional development.

Anyway, the other main characters are, naturally enough, King Kongmin (Mongolian name: Bayan Tem?r) and his wife Princess Nuguk. As I mentioned before, King Kongmin and I have a point in common, notably, we both married Mongolian princesses. Unlike the Marmot, King Kongmin would later give up women for boys, or as the Kyunghyang Shinmun would point out:

King Kongmin created a body called the Jajewi that brought handsome boys into the royal court. It’s said the king enjoyed engaging in homosexual sex with the boys everyday, and that he once engaged in group sex in the royal bed chamber.

King Kongmin overdrank and occasionally beat the boys. He also gave out awards and punishments as he pleased. He did not send the boys on vacations as stipulated in regulations. The boys would fight with one another for the king’s affection and grow jealous, and dissatisfaction grew over the violence and vacations not given.

One day, King Kongmin was lying in the royal bed chamber drunk. About six our seven of the boys of the Jajewi entered the bed chamber and stabbed the king with knives. His reforms unfulfilled, the king died in the prime of his life at the age of 45. His absorption into homosexual fornication might have been due to an abnormal mentality trying to fill in the emptiness in his heart.

Of course, those who subscribe to the “no gays in Korea” meme can at least console themselves with the hope that he learned his behavior from the Chinese or Mongolians.