Status and “Defunct” Offices in Early Modern Korea: The Case of Five Guards Generals (Owijang), 1864–1910

Why the early modern Korean state continued to appoint Five Guards generals, and who they were are unanswered questions with important social implications. By examining law codes, personnel records, and profiles of the generals of the Five Guards which devolved from a large central army to a small security force, this study shows that the government used the appointment to recognize a good service by those without any realistic prospect of achieving important high offices monopolized by the capital aristocracy. The generals tended to be individuals neither aristocrat nor commoner in status, but some were elderly aristocrats of scholarly distinction. Although many appointees saw the post purely as an honor and resigned after a brief tenure, officeholders of a military background often performed patrol duties. The generalship was different than scores of devalued ranks and offices sold by the state. By the late nineteenth century, intermediate status groups had accrued economic and cultural capital to the extent that the state, which needed their service and cooperation, could not fool them with empty honors. All the same, the aristocratic proprietors of the state had to maintain some gradation of honors so that they could insure the integrity of existing social hierarchy.