1850 Manuscript Map of Jeolla Province, Korea

A c. 1850 manuscript map of Jeolla Province, including Jeju Island, in southwestern Korea. Its author and intention are unknown, but the map is especially detailed on coastal settlements and islands.

A Closer Look

Coverage includes Jeolla Province, the southwestern-most of the eight traditional provinces of Korea. Cities and mountains are indicated throughout. Off the coast, many large and small islands are labeled, including Jindo (珍島), Heuksando (黑山島), and Jeju (濟州島), at bottom. Red lines denote roads leading through the province, as well as a maritime route along the coast.

Late Joseon Korea

This map most likely dates from the latter period of the Joseon Dynasty, when Korea encountered one crisis after another. Famines, uprisings, factional infighting at the court and among officials, and foreign invasions struck in succession or simultaneously. Capable governance and limited reforms allowed Joseon to stave off some of these threats, even defeating back-to-back French and American military expeditions in 1866. But Korea's isolationist policies and lack of more thoroughgoing reform left it vulnerable, and Japan gradually expanded its economic, political, and military influence until Korea became a virtual colony and then was annexed outright in 1910.

Jeolla – A Legacy of Resistance

During the Imjin War in the 1590s, when Japanese samurai invaded and overran much of Korea, Jeolla became the headquarters of Korean resistance, led by the brilliant naval commander Yi Sun-sin (이순신, 李舜臣, 1545 - 1598). In the late 19th and 20th century, Jeolla carried on this legacy of patriotism and resistance, being the main or a major base of the Donghak Peasant Revolution in 1894, the Uibyeong 'righteous armies' and independence activists who resisted Japanese colonialism, Communist-aligned rebels and activists in the late 1940s and during the Korean War, and democracy activists in the 1970s - 1980s, who were massacred following the May 1980 Gwangju Uprising.

Publication History and Census

This manuscript map was most likely drawn in the 19th century by an unknown author. While its purpose is unclear, it may have originally been bundled with maps of other Korean provinces in an atlas.