Yan Yu (diplomat)
Yan Yu was a Korean diplomat and ambassador, representing Joseon interests in a diplomatic mission to the Ashikaga shogunate (Muromachi bafuku) in Japan.
1409-1410 mission to Japan
King Taejong dispatched a diplomatic mission to Japan in 1409-1410.
- 1409 (Ōei 16, 3rd month): In the 10th year of King Taejong's reign, an ambassador from the Joseon court was received in Kyoto.[1]
This delegation to court of Ashikaga Yoshimochi was led by Yan Yu. The purpose of this diplomatic embassy was to respond to a message sent to the Joseon court by the Japanese shogun.[2] The Joseon envoy conveyed a letter of condolences on the death of the shogun's father; and he also brought gifts, including cotton cloth, tiger skins, leopard skins and ginseng.[3] Yan Yu was empowered to offer to send a copy of a rare Buddhist text to Japan.[1]
The Japanese hosts may have construed this mission as tending to confirm a Japanocentric world order.[4] Yan Yu's actions were more narrowly focused in negotiating protocols for Joseon-Japan diplomatic relations.[2]
Recognition in the West
Yan Yu's historical significance was confirmed when his mission was specifically mentioned in a widely distributed history published by the Oriental Translation Fund in 1834.[1]
In the West, early published accounts of the Joseon kingdom are not extensive, but they are found in Sangoku Tsūran Zusetsu (published in Paris in 1832),[5] and in Nihon ōdai ichiran (published in Paris in 1834). Joseon foreign relations and diplomacy are explicitly referenced in the 1834 work.
See also
- Joseon diplomacy
- Joseon missions to Japan
- Joseon tongsinsa
Notes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Titsingh, Isaac. (1834). Anales des empereurs du japon, pp. 325-326.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Kang, Etsuko H. (1997). Diplomacy and Ideology in Japanese-Korean Relations: from the Fifteenth to the Eighteenth Century, p. 275.
- ↑ Kang, p. 39.
- ↑ Arano Yasunori (2005). "The Formation of A Japanocentric World Order," The International Journal of Asian Studies, vol. 2, pp. 185-216.
- ↑ Vos, Ken. "Accidental acquisitions: The nineteenth-century Korean collections in the National Museum of Ethnology, Part 1," p. 6.
References
- Daehwan, Noh. "The Eclectic Development of Neo-Confucianism and Statecraft from the 18th to the 19th Century," Korea Journal (Winter 2003).
- Kang, Etsuko Hae-jin. (1997). Diplomacy and Ideology in Japanese-Korean Relations: from the Fifteenth to the Eighteenth Century. Basingstoke, Hampshire; Macmillan. 10-ISBN 0-312-17370-9; 13-ISBN 978-0-312-17370-8; OCLC 243874305
- Titsingh, Isaac, ed. (1834), [Siyun-sai Rin-siyo/Hayashi Gahō, 1652], Nipon o daï itsi ran; ou, Annales des empereurs du Japon. Paris: Oriental Translation Fund of Great Britain and Ireland.