Pre-Modern Korean Slaves (or Serfs?)

We have heard a lot about forced labor and slavery that are still pervasively practiced in North Korea today. It is definitely not a new phenomenon, as slavery has been a very crucial system that the Korean Peninsula preserved for dozens of centuries. When exactly did it start then?

Slavery in Korea existed since before the Three Kingdoms of Korea period, approximately 2,000 years ago.

Slavery has been described as “very important in medieval Korea, probably more important than in any other East Asian country.

Korean Studies scholar Mark A. Peterson suggests that Korea has the longest unbroken chain of slavery of any society in history, spanning about 1,500 years, which he attributes to a long history of peaceful transitions and stable societies in Korea.

The members of slave class during the Korean dynasties of Goryeo and Joseon (918–1897 AD) were called Nobi [노비].

Legally, they held the lowest rank in medieval Korean society just like the slaves and serfs of the Western Hemisphere.

They were also considered as properties, or chattel, and could be bought, sold, or gifted.

Nonetheless, some scholars argue that it is inappropriate to call them “slaves” because some nobis actually possessed property rights, legal entities and civil rights, and that they should be called as ‘serfs’ instead.

For instance, according to Bok Rae Kim: “In summary, on the economic, judicial and socio-cultural levels, it is evident that the nobis of the [Joseon] era were not ‘socially dead’ and that the nobi system at its zenith between the fifteenth and seventeenth centuries may be defined as ‘a serfdom developed under slavery’.”

There are two types of nobi, a household and a non-resident nobi. The former served as personal retainers and domestic servants in a house of a yangban (noble).

Household nobi served as personal retainers and domestic servants, and most received a monthly salary that could be supplemented by earnings gained outside regular working hours.

The latter, resided at a distance from the yangban’s house, were registered officially as independent family units and possessed their own houses, families, and land, and the number of non-resident nobi were far more numerous than household nobi.

The hierarchical relationship between yangban master and nobi was believed to be equivalent to the Confucian hierarchical relationship between ruler and subject, or father and son.

Some people became nobi as legal punishment for committing a crime or failing to pay a debt.

Some people would also voluntarily became nobi in order to escape crushing poverty during famines.

In the chakkae system, nobi were assigned two pieces of agricultural land, with the resulting produce from the first land paid to the master, and the produce from the second land kept by the nobi to consume or sell.

In order to gain freedom, nobi could purchase it, earn it through military service, or receive it as a favor from the government.

Since the outset of the Joseon dynasty and especially beginning in the 17th century, there was harsh criticism among prominent thinkers in Korea about the nobi system.

The hereditary nobi system was officially abolished around 1886 and 1887, and the rest of the nobi system was abolished with the Gabo Reform of 1894.

However, slavery did not completely disappear in Korea until 1930, during the Imperial Japanese rule.

Sources:

• Rhee, Young-hoon; Yang, Donghyu. “Korean Nobi in American Mirror: Yi Dynasty Coerced Labor in Comparison to the Slavery in the Antebellum Southern United States”. Working Paper Series. Institute of Economic Research, Seoul National University.
• Bok Rae Kim (23 November 2004). “Nobi: A Korean System of Slavery”. In Gwyn Campbell (ed.). Structure of Slavery in Indian Ocean Africa and Asia. Routledge. pp. 153 — 157. ISBN 978–1–135–75917–9.
• Palais, James B. Views on Korean social history. Institute for Modern Korean Studies, Yonsei University. p. 50.
• Seth, Michael J. A History of Korea: From Antiquity to the Present. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. p. 168. ISBN 9780742567177.
• Campbell, Gwyn. Structure of Slavery in Indian Ocean Africa and Asia. Routledge. p. 155. ISBN 9781135759179.
• Campbell, Gwyn. Structure of Slavery in Indian Ocean Africa and Asia. Routledge. p. 154. ISBN 9781135759179.
• Kim, Youngmin; Pettid, Michael J. Women and Confucianism in Choson Korea: New Perspectives. SUNY Press. p. 140. ISBN 9781438437774.
• Junius P. Rodriguez (1 January 1997). The Historical Encyclopedia of World Slavery. ABC-CLIO. pp. 392 — 393. ISBN 978–0–87436–8857.
• Peterson, Mark A.; Margulies, Phillip (2010). A Brief History of Korea. Infobase Publishing. p. 47. ISBN 9781438127385.
• Junius P. Rodriguez (1 January 1997). The Historical Encyclopedia of World Slavery. ABC-CLIO. pp. 392 — 393. ISBN 978–0–87436–885-7.