Choe Bu

Choe Bu was a Korean official during the early Joseon Dynasty. He is most well known for the account of his shipwrecked travels in China from February to July 1488. He was eventually banished from the Joseon court in 1498 and executed in 1504. In 1506 he was exonerated and given posthumous honors by theJoseon court.

About Choe Bu in brief

Choe Bu was a Korean official during the early Joseon Dynasty. He is most well known for the account of his shipwrecked travels in China from February to July 1488. He was eventually banished from the Joseon court in 1498 and executed in 1504 during two political purges. In 1506 he was exonerated and given posthumous honors by theJoseon court. Choe’s diary accounts of his travels became widely printed during the 16th century in both Korea and Japan.. Modern historians also refer to his written works, since his travel diary provides a unique outsider’s perspective on Chinese culture in the 15th century. The attitudes and opinions expressed in his writing represent in part the standpoints and views of the. 15th-century Confucian Korean literati, who viewed Chinese culture as compatible with and similar to their own. Choe was also one of the scholars who aided in the compilation of the Dongguk Tonggam in 1485, a history of Korea from ancient times. He was also well versed in Korean history, geography, and famous people; all this later helped him to dispel the notion of some Chinese officials that he was a Japanese pirate rather than a Koreanofficial who had unfortunately shipwrecking in China. His description of cities, people, customs, cuisines, and maritime commerce along China’s Grand Canal provides insight into the daily life of China and how it differed between northern and southern China during the15th century, writes Joo Hyun-jin.

In 1487 he was sent to Jeju Island to check the registers for escaped slaves from the mainland. While serving his post in Jeju as the Commissioner of Registers for the island, a family slave from Naju arrived on February 12, 1488 to alert Choe that his father had died. In keeping with his Confucist values, Choe prepared to leave his post immediately and begin the period of mourning for the loss of his father. The ship was blown far off course during a violent storm that lasted 14 days, his ship aimlessly drifting off towards China until reaching the Chinese coast off of Taizhou, Zhejiang, near Ningbo. We drowned and left it as heaven and earth, he prayed for death, although it was still raining heavily, and left them to drift aimlessly into the sea. The pirates robbed their ship of goods and rations, threw away the Koreans’ oars and anchor, and threw away their rations and spare goods, throwing away the sailors’ rations. On the sixth day during fairer weather, their ship came upon a group of islands in the Yellow Sea where Chinese pirates were moored and robbed them of their goods. They were robbed of their ship-deserted strip of goods, but this time the pirates did not strip the Koreans of their oars, and spared the crew of spare goods. The Koreans’ crew of 43 Koreans were spared.

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