Bak Don-ji


Bak Don-ji was a Korean scholar-bureaucrat, diplomat and ambassador, representing Joseon interests in the tongsinsa to the Ashikaga shogunate in Japan.

1398 mission to Japan

King Taejo dispatched a diplomatic mission to Japan in 1398–1399. This embassy to shogunal court of Ashikaga Yoshimochi was led by Pak. In part, the envoy was charged with conveying a response to a message sent to the Joseon court by the Japanese shōgun. In part, the Joseon ambassador sought Ashikaga involvement in suppressing pirate raiders which were believed to come from Japan. These pirates were variously known as wokou.
Pak and his retinue arrived in Kyoto in the early autumn of 1398. Shōgun Ashikaga Yoshimochi presented the envoy with a formal diplomatic letter; and presents were given for the envoy to convey to the Joseon court. When Pak returned from Japan in 1399, he brought with him more than 100 wakō captives, an explicit earnest of good fatih.
Pak also bore letters from the Ashikaga shōgun requesting original texts of Buddhist scriptures and Buddhist altar fittings.
Pak conveyed the following letter from Shōgun Yoshimitsu to the governor of Kyushu:
The Japanese hosts may have construed this mission as tending to confirm a Japan-centric world order. Pak's words and actions were more narrowly focused in negotiating protocols for Joseon–Japan diplomatic relations.

Recognition in the West

Pak's historical significance was confirmed when his mission was specifically mentioned in a widely distributed history published by the Oriental Translation Fund in 1834.
In the West, early published accounts of the Joseon kingdom are not extensive, but they are found in Sangoku Tsūran Zusetsu, and in Nihon ōdai ichiran. Joseon foreign relations and diplomacy are explicitly referenced in the 1834 work.