17세기 해수저온과 수산공물

Abstract

In the 17th century, Joseon experienced abnormally low temperature, which dropped the temperature of seawater and changed the ecosystem of the coasts along the Korean Peninsula, causing huge impacts on Joseon's fisheries. The most popular fish captured along the coasts of the Korean Peninsula were the codfish and herring in East Sea and the yellow corvina and mullet in Yellow Sea. Once the sea water temperature dropped without maintaining the proper temperature, those fish showed ups and downs. Some would go down the deep sea early and come out of it late, others would move to other regions, and still others would have a delay in growth. As a result, fish catches considerably dropped. The ones that were caught were small in size. Sometimes, there would be no fishing ground at all. Joseon's fisheries went into a long recession and its inshore fishery was shaken. The fishermen accordingly had a difficult time making a living, and the government experienced hardship with collecting fishing taxes and tributes. The soaring fish prices put pressures on consumers and suppliers. The fishery recession caused an emergency across the economy. The impacts of climate changes on fisheries were most notable in the area of tributes. Tributes of fish were to follow the prescribed rules in terms of delivery date, amount, and size. The long-term recession in fisheries, however, made it difficult to follow the rules. It was common that no delivery was made as there was no fish catch and that fish tributes whose size was smaller than 1 ja would be rejected. Every time that happened, the concerned officials were reprimanded, and the common people had to pay for the enormous costs for getting missing kinds of tribute fish and bigger ones. Such alternatives were allowed as delivering new kinds of fish or smaller ones and applying the rules according to weight and number of fish instead of size. Especially, the officials of Hamgyeong and Gyeongsang Province were put to daily reproaches and often replaced.