The passing of Korea/Chapter 33

by Homer Bezalee Hulbert

CHAPTER XXXIII
BURIAL CUSTOMS

BURIAL customs are not uniform throughout Korea, for the poor and the low-class people omit many of the finer points which are never forgotten in the case of a gentleman of means. If, then, we describe the treatment of the dead among the wealthy people of the upper class, it will be simply a task of elimination to describe that of any class in Korean society. For this purpose, let us take a Korean gentleman of means, the head of a household, and inquire how he is treated from the time he is known to be dying until his funeral obsequies are completed.

When he is found to be desperately ill, he is taken from his own chamber and removed to some other apartment. The Koreans have the notion that the change may possibly check the course of the disease. This is not akin to putting the dying man outside the house on a mat. This is done only by the lower and more superstitious classes, who believe that the death will pollute the house and make it unlucky.

When the patient is evidently in articulo mortis, he is taken back to his own chamber, and all his immediate family come in and sit in perfect silence about the room. A light piece of cotton batting is put to the dying man's mouth that the exact moment of death may be recorded. When the breath ceases to stir the cotton, death is supposed to have occurred, though in many cases, of course, life is not yet extinct.

When the man is pronounced dead, a blanket is thrown over the body, but no one begins to wail yet, for it might disturb the disembodied spirit which may still be hovering near. An hour passes, and then the family assembles again and the wailing commences. During this process, which is audible at some distance, the sentiments given expression to are almost all in commiseration of the dead. He is pitied for having died. His virtues are not commonly recited on such occasions, nor is reference made to his survivors, though there is no rule that would forbid this. In the wailing no subjective element appears. The wailers do not complain that they are bereft, nor wonder how they are to get along without the departed father or husband. After an hour of wailing some near relative, not a member of the household, or an intimate friend of the family remains to watch the body, and all others leave the room.

One of the trusted servants of the house, or some friendly neighbour, not of the upper class, takes in his hands an inner coat of the dead man, mounts to the roof of the house and takes his stand directly over where the body lies; This coat is of native cotton, never of silk or any imported goods, and has probably been kept in the family wardrobe for years for this special purpose. Standing thus, the man grasps the collar of the coat with his left hand and the hem at the bottom with his right and waves it three times toward the north. At the first shake he cries aloud the full name of the deceased, at the second shake the name of the highest rank that he ever attained^ and at the third he announces that the man is dead. The reason for shaking the garment is that, being something intimately associated with the person of the man, it forms the credentials of the one who is announcing the demise, as much as to say, " Here, behold the inner coat of such and such a man of such and such a rank; him I announce to be dead." The reason for shaking it toward the north is because shadows fall to the north. It is the direction of the shades, its colour being black.

This is done not only to announce the death to other living people, but also that the spirit of the dead man may hear, and so be sure that the momentous event has been properly published. The reason for shaking the garment three times is because of the dead man's in, eui, and ye, which may be lated respectively his "original nature," "righteousness" and "etiquette." This important ceremony completed, the man brings down the coat and spreads it over the body of its owner.

The family now assemble again and wail for fifteen minutes by the clock, after which the body is lifted from the floor and placed upon a plank, which is supported by two boxes made specially for the purpose. The head must be toward the south and raised a little higher than the feet. A screen is drawn around the body.

The next thing in order is to make the hon-pak-kwe, or " spirit ghost box." This is of wood, about eighteen inches long and twelve inches wide and deep. It is supposed to hold in some occult way the spirit of the dead. The box is neatly papered, and inside is placed a paper case in the shape of a box, and inside this is a piece of paper on which is written the name of the dead. Sometimes only blank paper is put in, and rarely both name and title are written. This spirit ghost box is first laid at the head of the dead man.

After these preliminaries have been arranged, a man is chosen from among the near relatives of the deceased to have charge of the funeral ceremonies, and one of the trusted servants is chosen to handle all the funeral expenses.

All the mourners, by which we mean the immediate family, look upon themselves as in some sense criminals upon whom rests the responsibility of the man's death. They put aside all coloured clothing and all silk, and dress in plain linen and cotton. All jewelry is put away; the hair is taken down. No boiled rice is eaten, but a kind of rice gruel takes its place. The mourners now go to the apartment of the dead. It has been divided down the middle by a curtain, and the men take their places on one side and the women on the other. Meanwhile the master of ceremonies has sent out written notices to the particular friends of the family, and they come, both men and women, and offer their condolences. The number of notices sent out varies from fifty to five hundred. If the recipient lives within reasonable distance, it is de rigueur for him to go and offer his condolences. It is customary to take along a little present of money, rice, linen, paper, candles or tobacco.

The one who is watching beside the body now takes warm water and washes it, using not a cloth but a piece of clean paper, while the family sit in the adjoining room or busy themselves in giving away to needy neighbours the old clothes of the deceased. In preparing the body for burial, the hair is tied up loosely, not in a regular top-knot, and all the combings, which have been sedulously preserved for years, are worked into the hair. All the teeth which have been extracted from the mouth of the dead man since his youth and all the finger-nail and toenail parings are put together in his pouch and laid beside him.

Meanwhile others have been busy making the new garments in which the body is to be dressed. Every part of the garments and the fittings of the casket must be new, the mattress, blanket, pillow, overcoat, coat, waistcoat, trousers, socks, wristlets, leggings, head-band and all. The body is now removed to a table specially prepared for the purpose, and a full dinner is placed before it. The relatives have by this time gathered from far and near, and they all assemble in the room adjoining and kneel, the men toward the east and the women toward the west. The relatives to the sixth remove are represented, and they all wail in concert. A pillow is brought, and each mourner comes forward in his turn and, placing his forehead on the pillow, performs a special ceremony.

The " spirit ghost box " is now brought and placed again at the head, with some of the man's clothes beneath it. His mouth is opened, and in it is placed some flour made of gluten rice.

This is for the purpose of holding in place a certain " jewel " that is put between the lips. This precious object is called the mu-gong-ju, or " pearl without a hole." It is not a real pearl, but a hard substance taken from the shell of a certain kind of huge clam that is found only near the mouth of the Nak-tong River. It is a rough substance and has no lustre, and it is

A prince's tomb

extremely rare. The clams are taken only by the net, and only one in about ten thousand is said to yield a mu-gong-ju. These are not sold, but are handed down from father to son as precious heirlooms. The Koreans believe that they have the power of self-propagation by a process of division, like certain polyps.

The body is now dressed in the new clothes and placed on a table specially made for the purpose. A screen is drawn around it, and over the screen is hung a banner on which is written the man's name and honours, and on a little table are placed some of his effects, such as pen, ink-stone, spectacles and seals. This completes the first day's work.

On the morning of the second day the professional undertaker comes and arranges the clothes of the deceased with great care, and proceeds to tie the body up with cords made of twisted paper. In tying the waist-cord he arranges the knot so as to resemble the Chinese character sim, for it is believed that all the canonised spirits arrange theirs so.

On the morning of the third day the undertaker brings the casket, which is not nailed, but is carefully dovetailed and fastened with wooden pegs. The bottom of it is covered an inch deep with gluten rice flour. This is to form a sort of cushion into which the body will sink a little, and so be prevented from moving from side to side as it is being carried to the grave. When everything is ready for placing the body in the casket, the sons of the dead man wash their hands, or perhaps take a full bath, and then go in and place the body carefully in its final receptacle. The face is covered with a very thin film of cotton batting, and beside the body are placed the finger-nail and toe-nail parings and the teeth which have been already referred to. The remaining space in the coffin is tightly packed with old clothes of the deceased, so as to prevent any movement of the body, and the cover is fastened on with wooden pegs. The coffin is invariably made of pine. The reason is fourfold. The pine, being an evergreen, is, in Korean eyes, the symbol of manhood, for it never withers or casts its leaves until it dies. In the second place, serpents and other reptiles will never go near it. In the third place, the pine never rots at the core, leaving the trunk a mere shell. In the fourth place, pine wood, when placed in the ground, decays rapidly and evenly, which, singularly enough, is a prime qualification with the Korean. Anything that tends to retard the process of dissolution is considered very unpropitious. This is in striking contrast to the belief of the ancient Egyptians and of most ignorant and superstitious peoples.

The fourth day after the death of a Korean gentleman is called the day for putting on mourning. The only ones who wear full mourning are the wife, the sons, the daughters and the daughters-in-law of the deceased. For the sons this consists of a wide mourner's hat made of bamboo, a head-band of coarse linen, a coat of the same material, a waist-cord of hemp, leggings of coarse linen, straw shoes and a posun, or face screen, of linen attached to two sticks which are held in the hands. For women, mourning consists in wooden hairpins, clothes of coarse linen and straw shoes.

After mourning has been assumed, all the mourners assemble in the room adjoning that in which the body lies, and wail, the men facing the east and the women the west. Only those who are very old may sit. No conversation is allowed. From this day all the mourners may return to their usual diet.

The undertaker places the head-bands, combs and other toilet articles of the dead beside the casket, as if he would soon wake up and use them. Fruits, vegetables, meats, nuts and wine are offered, and then the mourners come in and bow and wail again. If the burial should be delayed for three months, as is often the case, the family must come in and bow before the body on the first and fifteenth of each month. Whenever fresh fruit comes into the market, some of it must be offered the dead before the family can taste of it.

The interment usually takes place on the fifth, seventh, or ninth day after death, but in the case of high officials or very

The South Gate, Seoul

wealthy people it is usually delayed three months. This gives opportunity to make more elaborate preparations.

A burial site will long ago have been selected through the services of a chigwan, or geomancer. This is a science in itself, and has been described in a separate chapter. The day before the burial the geomancer and the chief mourner go to the grave site and superintend the marking out of the grave, being careful to drive stakes at the four corners, at the head, at the foot and in the middle of the grave plot. Later in the day the mourners bring food and sacrifice to the spirit of the mountain, calling aloud the name of the dead and announcing that he is to be buried at that spot. The chief mourner returns home and announces to the dead that a burial place has been prepared. Those that have remained at the burial site dig the grave, making the measurements very exact, so that the casket will fit. At the bottom they put sand mixed with lime, and pound it down hard, so as to form a solid bed for the casket to rest upon.

Two memorial stones have already been prepared. They are exact counterparts of each other. One of them is to be set up and the other to be buried in the ground at the foot of the grave. If the one that is set up is injured or destroyed, this buried one can be dug up and erected in its place. These stones are called the chisŭk, or "stone descriptive of the character of the dead."

The next work is the preparation of the sangyu, or "death carriage," by which is meant the bier or catafalque. In ordinary cases this is rented for the occasion, but in extraordinary cases a special one is made. It is supposed to resemble in shape the ordinary covered two-man sedan chair, or litter, in which people are carried about in lieu of wheeled vehicles; but it is made longer to accommodate the recumbent posture of the dead. It is covered with a rigid canopy, or roof, and the sides are enclosed. The whole is painted in the most gaudy and fantastic colours, a mixture of the Korean cardinal colours,—red, blue, yellow, white and black,—and is supported on men's shoulders by a network of poles and ropes. The number of carriers is determined by the size of the bier and the splendour of the occasion. Anywhere from eight to forty men may be employed to carry the " death carriage." They are all dressed in coarse linen, with tall linen caps.

One of the most important points about a funeral is the making of the sinju, or "spirit master." It might be better described as the "spirit tablet," for it consists of a plain piece of chestnut wood ten inches long, two inches wide and three-quarters of an inch thick. It is left unpainted, and nothing whatever is written on it, but with it is placed a sheet of paper on which are written the name and office of the deceased. This piece of wood is placed, together with the paper, in a small box made specially for it and painted black. This sinju, or "spirit tablet," is made of chestnut wood, because the Koreans believe that when a chestnut sprouts and the meat of the nut is used in feeding the growing sprout, the shell of the nut does not decay, but remains attached to the root of the tree until the latter dies. Thus they believe the seed is preserved, and this typifies the long life of the family. This tablet is kept in the house for three years, until the period of mourning is passed, and then it is placed in the sadang, or "soul house," preferably described as the ancestral tablet house. One of these tablet houses is found connected with the residence of every well-to-do gentleman. The use of a separate tablet house has of late fallen somewhat into disuse because of the danger of having the tablet stolen and held to ransom. To lose the sinju is an unspeakable calamity. Before burial, it was formerly the custom to carry the body of the dead to the tablet house, to let him take a look at it, but of late years it has been considered sufficient to carry the "spirit box" to the tablet house instead; but at the same time the casket must be moved a little, as if it were to be taken also.

All is now ready for the burial procession, which is a grand spectacular display. On it the heir sometimes squanders half of his patrimony. Korean folk-lore is full of stories of how the son, out of filial piety, spent the whole of his patrimony on his

STONE IMAGE NEAR TOMB

father's funeral. Nowadays such devotion is found only in books and traditions. The funeral procession forms in the late afternoon, and a start is made just at twilight. The reason for this is that at this hour the streets are less likely to be crowded; it is the quiet time of the day, and the spirit of the dead is less liable to be disturbed by the street cries and by the shouts of hucksters. It seems from this as if the Koreans believe that the spirit of the dead still accompanies the dead body.

First in the procession come two men abreast, dragging after them torches made of brushwood. The lighted ends trail on the ground, leaving a wake of sparks. Now and again they will raise the torches and whirl them about their heads until they break into flame again. Behind these comes the procession between two lines of lantern-bearers, each lantern being made of an iron frame, over which is draped red and blue gauze silk. This silk prevents the candles being blown out by the wind, but it is quite diaphanous.

First in the procession proper comes the master of ceremonies mounted on a horse, and behind him marches a man bearing aloft the myungjung, or banner, inscribed with the name and honours of the deceased. Then comes a line of lanterns across the street, connecting the lines of lanterns on the sides. Then comes a sort of cabinet or shrine, containing the spirit box and the spirit master or tablet. On either side of it march the female slaves of the deceased, with enormous piles of hair on their heads. They may number from two to half a dozen. Then, after another line of lanterns, comes the catafalque, which surges along slowly upon a mass of writhing shoulders, the bearers chanting a weird song, which enables them to keep in step. They have been given copious draughts of wine, and it is only their numbers that keep them on their feet. If the deceased is of high rank, a man will be standing on the bier on the front of the casket, and ringing a bell and marking time for the bearers, and another stands at the back for the same purpose.

Along either side of the catafalque walk a number of banner carriers, each banner recording the merits of the deceased. These are often sent by the friends of the dead, and correspond to the flowers that are sent as tokens of love in the West. Immediately behind the catafalque comes the chief mourner, the eldest son of the deceased, in a "chair" covered with coarse linen, and on either side walk the husbands of his slaves. The other members of the bereaved family follow in single file, their chairs being flanked by the husbands of the slaves of the dead man's relatives. Then come the distant relatives and the friends of the deceased, and the whole company is completed by a howling crowd of street boys, who add noise if not dignity to the obsequies.

It is forbidden to bury a body inside the walls of Seoul, nor can the dead be carried out of any of the gates at will; but two of the gates are reserved for this purpose, the so-called "Watermouth Gate" and the "Little West Gate." In times of pestilence, when a thousand people are dying a day in Seoul, as happened in the summer of 1886, it is easy to imagine that these gates are thronged with one stream of funeral processions. Especially was this so at that time, for the gates were closed and locked between nine o'clock at night and four o'clock the next morning.

Arriving at the burial site, the catafalque is placed under a temporary awning, and the whole party spend the night in a neighbouring village or in extemporised booths. Early in the morning the banner inscribed with the name of the dead is spread over the coffin and a little food is offered. After all have bowed and wept, the casket is placed on two transverse poles and carried to the grave. A compass is used to make sure that the casket lies in precisely the proper direction. A piece of black silk is placed over it, and upon this a thin board is laid. Lime is packed in on the sides and over the top to a depth of two inches, and then the grave is filled in with earth and lime mixed.

It is a question whether the shape and appointments of a Korean grave are not the most beautiful in the world. The

THE AMERICAN METHODIST CHURCH, SEOUL

gentle southern slope of a hill is dug into so as to form a wide flat space; the earth thus excavated is formed into a crescentlike bank all around the north, east and west sides of the plot.

In the centre, between the arms of this crescent, the grave is dug, and when the earth is piled up on it, the shape is that of an exact hemisphere. In front the ground is terraced down to the original slope of the hill. Back of the grave and on the two sides a thick grove of pine-trees is planted. Nicely turfed and well taken care of, this grave is simply exquisite in its simplicity and neatness. These little groves of pines about the graves form bright spots in an otherwise rather forbidding landscape. It must not be supposed that all graves are arranged as elaborately as this. The common people bury anywhere and everywhere, and so carelessly oftentimes that dogs and foxes dig into the graves and expose the bones of the dead.

In the case of very wealthy men or of princes, the grave site will be ornamented with stone figures of men and animals, arranged on either side and facing each other. Before the mound itself there will be a smooth polished stone, which is used as a table on which to place the sacrificial food each year.

The desecration of a grave is one of the most serious crimes in the Korean penal code. It is, of course, a capital offence. In our own land children are sometimes kidnapped and held to ransom, but in Korea it is the dead that are kidnapped, and a Korean will always give more for the return of his father's corpse than he would for his living son. Not infrequently a man finds a placard set up beside his ancestral grave stating that the head of the corpse has been taken away, but will be returned if a certain amount of money, always an enormous sum, is delivered at a certain specified place and time. A self-respecting Korean will put in pawn his whole estate to get back the body of his parent, or any missing part of it.