By Jeongnam Kim
(Former Senior Presidential Secretary for Education·Culture·Society, World Korean News advisor)
The town markets or the government-run shops in Gaeseong, the capital city of Goryeo played a role of a supply base for official as well as private merchants visiting abroad or for foreign merchants. There were more than 10 welcome houses, sometimes accommodating more than a few hundreds of travelers as a time depending on their status.
Byeokrando, located at the entrance to Gyaesung and Yeseung River, was an international trade port booming all year long with merchants from all over the world. In particular, there was an international convention opening in the winter season called "Palgwanhoe," in which a large number of participants from abroad offered tributes and the authorities concerned promoted an balanced and practical trade policy with a viable combination of an official and civic trade exchanges through envoys actively and independently depending on the changing situations of the neighboring countries.
In 2012, our country rose up to the world's rank 8th trading county, with its international trade passing the milestone of $1 trillion. Of course, this is a monumental feast of our time, and we are really proud of what has been achieved, but in fact, the overseas trading tradition has been handed down from the period of Goryeo dynasty. We had the 'Gyaeseung Merchants' who were renowned for their mercantile skills already in the Goryeo era.
Goryeo. where the Gaeseong merchants were active, was famous for Gingeng and celadon not only in Asian but also throughout the world. They were traded with such neighbors as Song China and Japan, and such far-out regions as the state of Yo erected by the Kiran tribes, Keum, or the country of the Jurchens, India and other Southeast Asian countries and as farther as Persia, Central Asia and Arabia.
A powerful clam, who had cumulated rich through maritime commerce with Dang China, held sway over this Gaeseong area before it was selected as capital of Goreyo. Wang Geon was one of them. These "Gaeseong Merchants" had grown to a large-scale organized group of business elites through their unique integrity, outstanding salesmanship, reasonable management style and a thorough professionalism. They were so powerful that they would shake the commercial influence not just the Gaeseong area but the whole country.
They were in charge of the Gaeseong city's financial matters and management, while taking care of the international trade connecting China and Japan. They also put into practice of a system under which they had their children work for other businesses so that they could learn the business practices of other business establishments. In addition, they developed a bookkeeping scheme called 'Sagae Songdo Chibubeob,' which kept the incomes and expenditures. This scheme was developed two hundred years before the double-entry bookkeeping system created in the West.
After the fall of the Goryeo Dynasty, the Gaeseong merchants would have faced a change with the initiation of a new dynasty, Joseon. The new government prohibited the civilians' trade activities, and a new elite group of businessmen began their town exclusive commercial activities in the new capital of Hanyang.
However, the tradition of the Gaeseong Merchants continued to maintain its existence until these days, their outstanding salesmanship, their organizational power and integrity still alive actively nationwide. It was known that during the Japanese colonial era, Japanese merchants failed to wield their influence in Gaeseong. Even now quite a number of Korea's big businessmen are from Gaeseong, and this is something to do with the spirit of the Gaeseong Merchants. In fact, their commercial genius is assumed to be the basis on which Korea has risen to the world's top trading status.
