1434년 辛保安 妻 鄭氏 分財記 연구

Abstract

The subject of this study is the “Property Inheritance Record” written by Mrs. Jeong in 1434, which was collected at Kyungpook National University Library. While most of the existing property inheritance records are known to have been produced in the 16th and 17th centuries, this record was made at the early Joseon period. It is the seventh earliest record among the reported property inheritance records in Korea. In terms of characters, composition of family members, and aspect of property inheritance, it was judged that this record was an important material to show the social aspects during the end of the Goryeo dynasty and the early Joseon dynasty. Because of severe damage to the front part, the background and reasons for her distribution of property cannot be accurately determined. However, it is assumed that there was the first distribution in 1418 before her husband Shin Bo-an died and, 16 years later, 1434 Mrs. Jung gave her all slaves to her two sons and two daughters. This time slaves missing in the first distribution and slaves delivered from several relatives are distributed. At present, Bun-geup mun-gi (分級文記) of a total distribution for her two sons and two daughters is not exist. Only Gip-bu mun-gi (衿付文記) of the detailed inheritance record for her eldest son Shin Sabong remains. All of the assets inherited by her eldest son Shin Sabong were Slaves, with a total of 51 slaves transferred from eight places. Through Mrs. Jeong’s Property Inheritance Record, this paper examined the composition of Shin family, inheritance culture and the feature of property inheritance during the early Joseon period. The features found as follows: First, there were Buddhist monk uncles on both sides of Shin Bo-an and Mrs. Jeong and the slaves were handed down by their consanguineous monks. This indirectly shows that in that period it was a common phenomenon that a son from a bureaucratic family leave his family to become a Buddhist monk, just as it was at the end of Goryeo Dynasty according to several record. Second, there are various and distinct examples of slave transmission from collateral relations. Unlike the general case that slaves inherited from lineal relatives such as father, mother, wife, and grandfather, in Jeong’s record, more collateral relatives such as uncles and aunts in distant kinship and even younger brother transmitted their slaves to Mrs. Jeong. And the number of slaves transmitted from those collateral relatives were 1.5 times many of them from lineal relatives.