Balhae (698): Dae Jo-yeong's Kingdom in Manchuria and Korea

Balhae (Bohai in Chinese) was a kingdom founded in 698 by Dae Jo-yeong, a former officer of the fallen Korean kingdom of Goguryeo, in what is now north-east China. After defeating a Tang army, Dae and his followers of Goguryeo and Mohe origin built a state that came to rule Manchuria, northern Korea and part of the Russian Far East for more than two centuries. Its history is claimed by Korea, China and Russia alike.

Background: after Goguryeo

When Tang China and the Korean kingdom of Silla destroyed Goguryeo in 668, during the Silla unification of Korea, the Tang deported many Goguryeo families to its frontier regions. Some were settled around Yingzhou, near modern Chaoyang in Liaoning, a garrison town that also held Khitan and Mohe peoples. The Mohe were a group of Tungusic-speaking tribes of Manchuria, some of whom had long served Goguryeo.

In 696 the Khitans of Yingzhou, led by Li Jinzhong and Sun Wanrong, rose in revolt against the rule of Wu Zetian. Amid the chaos, a Goguryeo leader named Dae Jung-sang (Qiqi Zhongxiang in Chinese sources) and the Mohe chief Geolsa Biu led their peoples east, away from Tang control.

The founding in 698

Wu Zetian first offered the leaders titles to win them back. When Geolsa Biu refused, a Tang force under the Khitan general Li Kaigu pursued them and killed him. Dae Jung-sang also died around this time, and his son Dae Jo-yeong took command of both groups.

At Cheonmunryeong (Tianmenling, “Heavenly Gate Ridge”), Dae Jo-yeong turned and defeated the pursuing Tang army; Li Kaigu escaped. With the Tang distracted by the Khitans and by the Eastern Turks, Dae led his people to the Dongmou Mountain area, near modern Dunhua in Jilin, and in 698 declared himself king. He named his state Jin (Zhen).

Growth and recognition

Dae Jo-yeong sought allies among the Eastern Turks and Silla and quickly absorbed neighbouring Mohe groups. In 713 the Tang Emperor Xuanzong, accepting the new power, granted him the title Prince of Bohai Commandery. From then on the state was known as Bohai, or Balhae in Korean.

Dae Jo-yeong died in 719 and was honoured as King Go. His son, King Mu (r. 719-737), expanded the kingdom aggressively and even sent a naval raid against the Tang port of Dengzhou in Shandong in 732. In a letter to the Japanese court in 727, he described his realm as having recovered the old lands of Goguryeo.

King Mun (r. 737-793) turned to peace and building. He adopted Tang-style government with three chancelleries and six ministries, and around 755 moved the capital to Sanggyeong, the Upper Capital, near modern Ning’an in Heilongjiang. Laid out in a grid like Tang Chang’an, it became the heart of a system of five capitals.

Key people

Dae Jo-yeong (died 719), posthumously King Go, founded the kingdom. Dae Jung-sang, his father, began the flight from Yingzhou. Geolsa Biu, a Mohe chief, led the Mohe groups until his death in battle. King Mu and King Mun, Dae Jo-yeong’s son and grandson, enlarged and organised the state.

Culture and fall

Balhae used Chinese characters for government and sent students to Tang China, while keeping links with Goguryeo traditions such as heated floors and certain tomb styles. Tombs of Princess Jeonghye and Princess Jeonghyo, daughters of King Mun, contain inscribed epitaphs, and Princess Jeonghyo’s tomb preserves wall paintings of attendants. Balhae sent over thirty embassies to Japan between 727 and the early 10th century, trading furs for silk. Chinese sources called it the “flourishing land in the east”.

In the early 10th century Balhae weakened through internal strife. In 926 the Khitan leader Abaoji, founder of the Liao dynasty, took the capital and made it a client kingdom called Dongdan. Large numbers of refugees, including the crown prince Dae Gwang-hyeon, fled to the Korean kingdom of Goryeo.

Legacy and debate

Ancient Chinese histories disagree about Dae Jo-yeong’s origins: the Old Book of Tang calls him “of a separate branch of Goguryeo”, while the New Book of Tang describes him as a Sumo Mohe attached to Goguryeo. Modern scholarship generally sees Balhae as a mixed state with a Goguryeo-descended elite and a largely Mohe population.

In 1784 the Korean scholar Yu Deuk-gong argued in his Balhaego that Silla and Balhae together formed a “North-South States” period of Korean history, a view that is standard in Korea today. Chinese historians generally treat Balhae as a regional state of the Tang world, and the question remains politically sensitive.

Timeline

• 668: Goguryeo falls to Tang and Silla; many people are deported to Yingzhou.
• 696: The Khitan revolt at Yingzhou; Dae Jung-sang and Geolsa Biu lead their peoples east.
• 698: Dae Jo-yeong defeats Tang forces at Cheonmunryeong and founds the state of Jin.
• 713: Tang names Dae Jo-yeong Prince of Bohai Commandery.
• 719: Dae Jo-yeong dies; King Mu succeeds.
• 727: Balhae sends its first embassy to Japan.
• c. 755: King Mun moves the capital to Sanggyeong.
• 926: The Khitan Liao conquer Balhae.

Why it matters

Balhae kept a powerful kingdom alive in Manchuria and northern Korea after Goguryeo’s fall, linking the peoples of the region with Tang China and Japan for over two centuries. Its fall shaped the later history of north-east Asia, and the debate over its identity shows how medieval states can become part of modern arguments about national history.