Lunar New Year: A time for 'manly sport'

A "seokjeon" stone battle is held outside of Seoul in 1902. Robert Neff Collection

By Robert Neff

The city walls and nearby hills were covered with a great mass of white-clad Koreans staring down into a vacant lot with nervous anticipation. In harsh voices bets were made between the men, sealed with drinks of alcohol and punctuated with hoarse laughter, while children pushed their way eagerly to the front for a better view of the impending stone battle.

These stone battles, known as "seokjeon," were held twice a year throughout the country ― usually in vacant fields just outside of the city gates. The participants were generally the young men of two different villages, or families and their friends that had suffered some wrong from their opponents. Other times the battles were between two guilds that had decided to use these battles as a way of settling their differences. These battles were especially brutal and usually involved several hundred men.

The Korean government looked upon these "games" as a means of promoting martial spirit and allowing the people to let off some excess steam. Policemen were present, but they were not there to prevent the fights but to keep the crowds from getting caught up in the battle. Soldiers also witnessed the event, but were prohibited from taking part unless they were off-duty, in which case they often participated, sans the uniform, with violent glee.

The two teams advanced towards each other from opposite directions, their approach heralded by the intense taunting and cheering of spectators. The combatants were armed with stones that had been polished and rounded by boys, as well as iron and wooden cudgels, armor of twisted straw, wooden shields and leather caps for helms. The stone throwers stood in the front rank while the cudgel wielders formed the second rank.

Calmness fell upon the land as the two leaders, a short distance ahead of their "soldiers," glared at one another and shouted taunts, challenging the other to prove himself a man. Suddenly one of the leaders shouted a battle cry and was answered by a barrage of stones, and the two sides raced across the vacant expanse towards each other.

These battles lasted for hours if not days, and surged from one side of the field to the other, causing the spectators that had gotten too close to the action to flee for their lives or be trampled by the rush of the fleeing participants and their pursuers. The game ended when one side was chased from the field of battle. The victors were heroes ― models for young boys to emulate ― and the defeated sulked off, swearing revenge for the rematch in six months. Even the palace and King Gojong kept abreast of the results ― but probably more for political reasons than entertainment.

The injuries were horrendous: broken bones and noses, shattered teeth, bruised bodies and, not surprisingly, there were often casualties. Husbands, sons and brothers died in these games, but no one was punished for their deaths ― the deaths were deemed unavoidable accidents.

The adults were not the only ones to participate in these wars. Small boys were encouraged to take part in battles of their own, believing that it would make them strong, brave and fearless. Unlike the adults, the children fought in the city on the main streets in Jongno, and along Cheonggye Stream. Large crowds gathered to watch the battles, make wagers, encourage their sons and yell curses at the other side ― much like our modern little league games.

Mothers brought their sons, some as young as eight, and divided them into two teams of equal numbers, usually neighborhood against neighborhood. Then one boy on each side ― the bravest and the cockiest ― was chosen to act as the leader, given a large red felt hat (used as a helmet) and armed with a small wooden club. These "leaders" then faced one another, raised clubs over their heads and tried to intimidate their opponent with curses and threats of dire damage. Naturally they were afraid and hesitated, but they knew that their parents and neighbors were all watching them and it was impossible for them to back down ― already masculine pride stiffened their backbones. Suddenly they lunged at one another and the battle began in earnest. Stones whistled through the air and rained down upon the young boys. Club met flesh and bone, bruising and breaking when it did. Screams of pain from the children and cheers of excitement from the crowd filled the air.

Like the adults' battles, the fights were long and there were serious injuries. The victors were cheered by the crowds, given presents by their parents and treated as heroes by their peers, while the vanquished made their way home and licked their wounds in humiliation.

In February 1894, shortly after his appointment as acting consul-general, Christopher Thomas Gardner and his young daughter encountered one of these stone battles. Gardner was naturally alarmed and fled the area quickly. Once he and his daughter were safe, he asked a yangban (a member of the upper class or gentry) for an explanation. The man replied:

"In the winter the people have nothing to do, so the strong and brave men of all the towns of [Korea] come to [Seoul] to play and fight. The strong men of one town fight the strong men of another town. I go on the wall of the city to look. People must not fight in the city. I keep far away. Then they throw stones at each other, and beat each other with sticks. If they kill each other it does not matter."

Gardner was quite impressed with this Korean "fondness for manly sports" and he wasn't alone. Accounts of these battles appeared frequently in letters sent home and many were subsequently published in small hometown newspapers or in books and magazines. Many of the more adventurous Western men even joined the throngs of Korean spectators from the safety of perches on city walls and nearby rocky crags. Gardner later lamented: "Had I known then how polite a [Korean] mob is, I would have gone on and seen the fun."

Even some of the more adventurous and foolhardy of the missionary children escaped the protective watch of their mothers to watch upon the battles in awe and wonder. For the children, there seems to have been little danger from the combatants ― I can easily imagine the Korean spectators would have done their best to protect the curious foreign children from getting hurt. I think the real danger to the children were their parents, who did not approve of these battles, and would have surely tanned their offsprings' bottoms for sneaking away from the safety of home to view (what they perceived to be) these barbaric displays of violence.

However, as we shall see in the next article, in February 1903, it wasn't stones and clubs the spectators had to worry about ― it was a gun-wielding American.

Robert Neff has authored and co-authored several books including, Letters from Joseon, Korea Through Western Eyes and Brief Encounters.