한국문헌商賈說話에 나타난 富의 蓄財와 재분배 연구

Abstract

This paper is written to study about accumulation and redistribution in the Merchant Tales from the literature narratives. The author is the first researcher that actually starts a discussion about the figures in the literature narratives, who trade commodities for profit. The narratives are fluid, and its fluidity is the nature of the narratives: this is the reason why the changing progress is important in the narratives. Thus, each variants has its own value. As the compilers of the literature narratives could modify, merge, change the expressions with intention, there are different types of changes from the oral narratives, and the study is focusing on the merchant tales in the literature narratives. In this study defines a Merchant literature narrative as a story of which the main topic is about various events/activities involved with commercial trades. In the Merchant literature narratives, it is negatively described that the figures accumulate their wealth by commercial trades, as the Scholar-official recorded most of the literature narratives; the writers had a clear purpose and describes it with subject views. Consequently, the negative attitude towards commercial profit creation stemmed from Confucianism. Compared to the Merchant oral narratives, the literature narratives have much fewer pieces in which the complete story is focused on the merchants or trades; trades between the characters are fragmentarily described in the literature narratives. Those capitalistic aspects are excluded in the narratives, as the compilers had the view of Confucianism. This study includes as the followings: Firstly, commercial trades shown in the Korea literature narratives are reviewed. From the early period of Joseon, the merchants were the important part of the commercial policy until the late period, and the commerce were prosperous. As a consequence, the merchants gained the powers and made various evils. Thus, negative perspective on the merchants had been established, and the stories were recorded by the Scholar-official, telling that the excessive profit creation was against Confucianism. This is the reason why the most pieces of the Merchant literature narratives advise to moderate excessive profit-making and to return the profit to the society. Secondly, the Merchant literature narratives are categorized. The categories are: "share in concord with neighbours", "share in concord with family", and "caution against avarice". With these categories, the economic view of the Scholar-official has been studied. Thirdly, with the categories, the Scholar-official's perspective on the accumulation is reviewed. The writers advise to overcome the poverty, pursuing mutual coexistence, and to put the highest priority on the families in any case; although the profit was made by misconduct, it is considered as a charitable deed that the wealth was shared with others. In this study with the Merchant literature narratives deals with the economic view of the Scholar-Official that they regard the importance of the family, the neighbours, and the public order. The limit of this study, however, is that different views between the social grades are not thoroughly discussed.