Play a Trick and Get a Queen: “Divine Tricksters” in Ancient Korea (and Beyond)

Abstract

The figure of the “gentleman thief” is well attested in the literature of many cultures, and even episodes present in religious texts do not avoid presenting the good side, if in evidence, of thieves, cheats, and evildoers (just think of the case of Disma Δυσµάς in the apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus).¹ After all, salvific religions such as Christianity and Buddhism have always contraposed the idea of sin to the concept of shame present in other societies (first of all the Confucian one); sin, unlike shame, is surmountable and forgivable, following a sincere repentance.²

Nevertheless, there are thieves and other outlaws who act for a righteous purpose, as reparation for the errors produced by an unfair and corrupt society, and such characters, who have become almost revolutionaries, are also found in Confucian societies. The rebels of Liangshanpo 梁山泊 in China³ and characters such as Hong Kiltong 洪吉童 or Chŏn Uch'i 田禹治 (also called Chŏn Unch'i 全雲致)⁴ in Korea need no particular introduction.

“Outlaws and gentlemen” are yet another set of characters (often inspired by actual historical figures) in tales, both ancient and less ancient, from the West and the East—ranging from Robin Hood to Arsène Lupin and from Aladdin to Rocambole. Such figures are sometimes leaders of sects and guilds (think of Hong Kiltong's Hwalbindang 活貧黨, “Society for the Redemption of the Poor”), and in general they are ordinary subjects, often poor and discriminated against by the wider society. But what happens when the thieves and tricksters are gods, saints, or kings?

This article examines from a structuralist approach three famous cases found in ancient Korean literature that present fraud and deception perpetrated by illustrious and eminent characters who go unpunished. Starting from the common denominator of the human mind as a divine gift, Korean stories will be inserted in an anthropological model present across many cultures, with the end result emerging as an important piece in the varied cultural and transnational kaleidoscope—the tòpos of the “divine/illustrious trickster.” For this reason, I compare the three Korean cases with three cases from different Western cultures. The article moves on two different levels. The first level examines, structurally, the dynamics of the concept of the trickster as it came to be formed in various human societies over the millennia. The second level deals with the anthropological aspects typical of certain cultures, which lie hidden behind the episodes described. It follows that the approach in the first part is typically structuralist, while in the second part it is historical-cultural.

Cogito, Ergo (Homo) Sum

Odysseus is not a god, and yet he is often described as “strong and divine,”⁵ within a range of epithets, especially in Homer's poems, aimed to make easier the recitation and the composition of metrical schemes. Indeed, the adjective “divine” (δῖος) occurs frequently whenever the poet writes about heroes; heroes are not ordinary people, but something halfway between man and god. In particular, Odysseus is well known for his astuteness, and it is no coincidence that his protector divinity is Athena, the goddess of knowledge and wisdom. Knowledge belongs to man, and only man is able to transmit his cognitive experience to descendants, forming what is called “culture,” a prerogative typical to humans which is very different from the “nature” possessed by every living being. Adam and Eve realize they are naked (the awareness of nudity, in fact, is a cultural element) only after eating the fruit of knowledge, which also gives them the faculty to distinguish Good from Evil, which belongs to humans alone. But there is a price to pay: from that time hence, Paradise will no longer be a right, but something that must be conquered, by doing Good and refraining from Evil. If there were a Paradise for animals, all animals would go to Paradise, since they only follow their “nature,” or their natural instinct.

The creation of man in the image and likeness of God concerns above all the mind, since God has no form. The mind is what separates man from animals and brings him closer to the dimension of the ineffable—to Heaven or God. In other words, mind is a gift from Heaven, as believed in many cultural contexts. The mind, therefore, represents the faculty and the capacity of thinking and acting as a consequence of thinking, both for good and for evil. And it is no coincidence that in the linguistic field the idea of man is inextricably united with the concepts of thought and memory (only man, in fact, remembers experience and transmits it to posterity, creating in this way culture as opposed to brutal nature). I will only give a few examples here.

The root *M-N, linked to the concept of “man,” “to think,” or “memory” (also in a negative sense), is easily found in Eurasia within what should have been the protolanguage conventionally called Proto-Boreal. This root is at the basis of English words such as mind (Middle English: mynde) and man, German Mann, Italian mente (mind), but it is also traceable in Sanskrit manas मनस् (mind) and Manu मनु (the first man), in old Greek µιµνῄσκω (to remember) and Μνηµοσύνη (goddess of memory and mother of the nine Muses, because the arts are the offspring of memory and human experience), in Hungarian monda (legend, tale), in Nenets manƶ (to think, to ponder), in Russian запомнить (to remember), and so forth.

But the mind can also be obtuse or used for illicit purposes. So here we find terms like the Turkic mundus/munduz (fool), the Italian menzogna (lie) and mentire (to lie), the Spanish mentida (lie), the Khanty müṇərkholta (to faint, to lose consciousness), and the Korean maengch'u and mŏngch’ŏngi (both meaning “stupid,” “idiot”) and mongtchach'ida (to deceive, to simulate).

A high-minded person is a “genius.” But genius is a Latin word indicating a tutelary deity, and in turn is connected with the idea of “to generate,” “to produce,” “to create” (see Latin gignere [to beget] and old Greek γίγνοµαι [to be born] and γένος [descent, family]). Hence the modern term engineering. Creation is first of all a product of mind, but creation is also a divine or supernatural act: in this regard it cannot be excluded that genius is also connected with the Arabic jinn جِنّ‎ (a term that refers to various kinds of supernatural beings). In this way, therefore, the mind also becomes an instrument of strength and power. Gods thus prevail over humans, and humans prevail over animals. However, since mind is not dispensed in equal measure, it follows that humans come to prevail over other humans, thus also receiving, in many cases, the approval of the society in which they live. In the Islamic context, therefore, card games are stigmatized as they are usually linked to the whim of luck, but chess is well tolerated or even encouraged, because the results of the matches are the result of the human mind, which is the reflected image of God.⁶ In ancient Sparta, what was dishonorable was not so much stealing as being discovered during the theft.⁷ In the Sumerian Poem of Enmerkar and Ensuhgiranna, a strange war without armies is waged between the cities of Uruk and Aratta.⁸ The fighters are in fact two champions of sorcery, each designated by a city, who in turn demonstrate their abilities, and eventually Uruk is the winner.

The awareness of the dual nature (beneficial and evil) of the human mind is manifested in all probability already in prehistoric times, when the hunter-man ends up ritualizing and exorcising his own activity as a consequence of the fact that he “steals” the life of animals by virtue of his cognitive superiority. By hunting, however, one learns the characteristics and behaviors of the various animals. In this way, some animals such as buffalo or bear become symbols of strength for man, while others, like wolves (whose success in hunting does not depend on the individual but, as in the case of man, on coordinated actions among different individuals), fascinate the first hunters and end up becoming totemic progenitors of man himself.

Nevertheless, it will not have taken long for men of the past to find that the most “cunning” animals are not always the strongest. A sort of list of particularly smart animals has thus been created which has become fixed in the collective imagination of many peoples, even if at times it has been denied by modern ethology.⁹ This is how animals such as the fox and corvids (crows, ravens, magpies, etc.) have become proverbial: foxes and jackals do not need any introduction, while the name of “thief” has been given to cats (see for example the proverbial toduk koyangi of Korea) and corvids (the magpie in Italy is still called “gazza ladra” or “thieving magpie”).¹⁰ Animals such as the fox and the squirrel (the latter considered to be smart because he stocks up on food) share the same linguistic root within the concept of “hair,” “fur,” or “furry animal.” Thus, from the root *W-L(a) we have terms such as the Sanskrit vṛka वृक (wolf, but also fox),¹¹ the Avestan Persian varәnā (fur), the Latin vulpis (fox), the ancient Greek (v)alopex (ϝ)ἀλώπηξ (fox), the Gothic wulfs, the English wolf and wool, the Russian volosy волосы (hair), the Italian volpe (fox), vello (fur), and ululare (to howl: the crying of wolves and dogs), the Finnish villa (fur), the Evenki ulä (wolf) and ulīki (squirrel), and so forth. But we also have terms, derived from the same root, connected with the idea of “to lie” and “to cheat.” Such is the case with Finnish valhe (lie), Gaelic (Middle Irish) fell (cheat: <*WLxn-), English felony, Latin furare (to steal, to deceive), old Italian fellone (criminal/traitor), and so forth (Paliga 2007: 121).

This deductive process carried out by humans proves decisive in creating all the minor supernatural entities capable of making, just for fun, jokes and other deceptions more or less harmful to man. Figures such as gnomes and elves reveal the caricature and parody of the gods in their physical appearance, and this is also revealed by their names: the Germanic term kobold as well as the English goblin, for example, have the same root as the old Greek kobalos κόβαλος, “dwarf” or “thieving/trickster sprite/dwarf.” The κόβαλοι were followers of Dionysus and, according to mythological tradition, robbed even Heracles when he was sleeping. Dionysus is a god linked to the ancient Mediterranean religion prior to the arrival of the Indo-Europeans, and it is known that he remained a transgressive divinity in the pantheon of the classical world. The social chaos represented by him and his followers (Silenus, the satyrs, and, precisely, the κόβαλοι) could be the consequence of the ancient conflict between Indo-European and Mediterranean cultural models (see Riotto 2017b). In this way, ridiculed deities who play tricks on the humans of the new social and moral order would have been created following a religious revolution, remaining as vestiges of the past (at once feared, respected, and depreciated) to be exorcised.

But if corvids and elves, in terms of absolute strength, are the poor relatives of eagles and gods, having to make up for their physical deficiencies with their intelligence, why could humans, as bad copies of the gods, not try to put themselves at least on the level of the gnomes to take advantage of some situation with tricks and deceptions? Before going into the topic, however, we should first spend a few words on elves, gnomes, and other similar creatures.

The Professional Tricksters of Collective Imagination

Over time, an intermediate category of minor supernatural being is formed between humans and the gods, who, incapable of great creative endeavors, are nevertheless capable of interfering heavily in the daily life of humans. These entities remain in the supernatural sphere of human perception, but they belong not so much to religion as to religiosity, the latter being a personal religious attitude and feeling, strongly imbued with cultural elements of its own tradition, which is not necessarily linked to a particular historical religion and its dogmas.

We find these in almost all the places of the world, and their names change according to the cultures by which they were created and to which they belong. Thus, there are, for example, dwarves, goblins, kobolds, gnomes, elves, gremlins, leprechauns, kallikantzaroi/καλλικάντζαροι, folletti, jólasveinar, nisser, duendes (dwendes in the Philippines), laftraches, ‘ngannamenta, domovoj/домовой, Korean tokkaebi,¹² and Japanese tsukumogami 付喪神. They are different from ghosts or spirits, being considered as divinities or as mortals of a human or animal nature/aspect. Sometimes, as in the cases of tokkaebi and tsukumogami, they represent the transformation of used and discarded objects. They may act in a more or less good or evil way, but all of them are adept at playing tricks, such that humans have to use all their intelligence and experience in order to avoid or frustrate their attacks.

The systematic study of divine tricksters as an important theme of folklore and collective imagination starts in the first half of the twentieth century, thanks to two well-known ethnologists, Paul Radin (1883–1959) and Károly Kerényi (1897–1973). The starting point for Radin's studies was the figure of the Wakdjunkaga (the one who plays tricks), a main character of the collective imagination of Native Americans of the Hochunk ethnic group, better known as the Winnebago.¹³ The expression “divine trickster,” however, was first used by Kerényi (Radin 1956: 9–11).

What emerges from the studies of such scholars is that the trickster belongs to a conception of the world no less religious than that of the Church, thus constituting an element of religiosity alternative to the official faith, of which we have spoken above. In this way, the folklore trickster becomes a “divine trickster,” that is to say, a deceptive deity representing the “paradoxical category of sacred amorality” (Hyde 2010: 10). Differently than the major gods, the divine trickster does not “create” but transforms (similarly to wizards) what has already been created, destroying the old established order and building a new one. We must pay close attention to this detail, because the deceptions perpetrated by kings and presented in this study are often modifiers of a political status quo, by heavily altering the dynasties or forming new alliances (and therefore new destinies) for their kingdoms. This transformative capacity is well suited to the figure of the kings of the past, who concentrated in themselves the functions of rulers, priests, and magicians, thus becoming absolutely sacred figures: we must not forget, in this regard, that many kings and heroes of classical mythology descend from divinities.

The sacredness with which the divine tricksters are invested favors their emulation by humans, who thus become aware of the fact that a certain moral and civil reality can be changed, with intelligence if possible, or with violence if necessary. We begin to glimpse, therefore, the connection between the divine trickster and the figure of the “good brigand,” and not only this: we can also see the positive side of the trick and deception if this can help avoid a war or any other type of armed conflict.

This is all the truer for sovereigns, whose sacredness brings them closer to the divine tricksters than others, while at the same time they must obey that sense of responsibility aimed at avoiding the outbreak of a conflict until the very end. In other words, differently than tokkaebi and the like, tricks played by kings generally have a precise scope and purpose. In this way, getting a woman (and even more so, a queen) by deception becomes a preferable option to a forced marriage following a war of conquest. This is the instinct and first priority of the hunter, be it man or animal: to obtain his prey by running the least possible danger. Leaving episodes like the “Kidnapping of the Sabine Women” as extrema ratio, therefore, a king (as leader of a complex society) will try to get a queen with cunning; if he has not yet become a king, he will try to become one by inventing some stratagem to marry a princess.

Classical antiquity (among other traditions) tells us that a certain type of crime, understood as a transformative action external to the codified (or fossilized?) morality of a society, can find supporters even among the Olympian gods. This is the case of Hermes, god of shrewdness and intelligence but also of thieves, traders, and, not by chance, alchemists and experts in transformations.¹⁴ He transforms himself, takes on feral features, plays tricks, makes people fall asleep and awakens them;¹⁵ in sum, he is a true divine trickster able to propose an existence out of the constraints of written laws and lived in the name of fantasy. In this way, the Hermetic man alchemically renews his soul with brilliant ideas, tricks, and stratagems capable of overturning what could be called destiny. Mutatis mutandis, such is the lifestyle that will triumph later in Spanish picaresque literature, in literary masterpieces such as Lazarillo de Tormes and Guzmán de Alfarache.

All that we have said leads to the conclusion that deception is not always an execrable thing; on the contrary, it can represent a peaceful solution to a political or religious issue. This is of particular value when deceivers are VIPs like kings or saints. As representatives or vicars of a god or of Heaven, in fact, they enjoy (at least theoretically) more than others of that intelligence which, a priori, has long been considered a super-infused virtue donated by Heaven. In this way, they themselves become divine tricksters.

No Simpleton, No Trickster (1): Three Cases from Korean Folklore

We have seen how characters invested with sacredness such as sovereigns and saints can be considered divine tricksters if they resort to deceptions aimed at obtaining a profit for the kingdom or changing (for better or for worse) a certain context and a certain situation.

In order for the deception to take place, however, there must also be a counterpart who is deceived: according to a Sicilian proverb, in fact, “Senza minchiuna nenti marpiuna” (No simpleton, no trickster). In our case, we will see that, at least as regards the episodes reported here, the deceived will be (directly or indirectly) three sovereigns (two mortal kings and even the heavenly king), but the ultimate goal of the deception will always be possession (or rescue) of a “noble” woman or, in any case, of a noble female being.

These episodes will be compared with other similar stories present in the folklore of other cultures, where we will see that women will be the ones deceived. What socio-anthropological implications all such tales may have will be the topic of the final reflections. In the first episode, the protagonist is T'arhae 脫解, the fourth king of Silla 新羅,¹⁶ as reported in Sui chŏn 殊異傳:¹⁷

We notice immediately in the episode that the deceived characters are not one but two—namely, Hogong and the king of Silla himself. The figure of T'arhae seems to belong more to legend than to history, and yet it poses key questions about Korea's distant past and about Silla in particular. The sources agree in saying that he was a foreigner who arrived in Korea in a more or less improbable way, capable of winning the attention of the local sovereign thanks to actions that are anything but fair and orthodox. The story narrated in the Sui chŏn offers a meager and synthetic profile of the character, but the first book of the Samguk yusa is much more lavish in its details. We can thus know, among other things, that T'arhae's mother was a princess of the kingdom of Chŏngnyŏ 積女, a place name that is sometimes associated with fabulous “women's countries” (whose existence, however, is certainly not limited to Korean folklore; see, for example, Jay 1996) called Yŏguk 女國 or Yŏin'guk 女人國. T'arhae, however, declares that he comes from Yongsŏng.²⁵ We also learn that the infant T'arhae, along with his servants, had been locked in a chest on a boat apparently set adrift, but actually driven by a superior will. After a first stop in Kaya, the boat, despite the attempts of the locals to keep it, had moved to Silla and there had been hauled ashore by Ajinŭisŏn 阿珍義先, a talented fisherwoman and the mother of Hyŏkkŏse, the founder of the nation.

Whatever the case, T'arhae and his entourage are graciously welcomed and the prodigious child tells all the events that had brought him there. Subsequently, the episode of the deception against Hogong is also narrated, more or less as we read it in Sui chŏn, and also the episode of the marriage with the (eldest) daughter of King Namhae 南解, whom we learn here was called Ani 阿尼.²⁶ Other minor episodes follow, and finally the death and funeral of T'arhae, who has now become ruler of Silla. The Samguk yusa also gives hypotheses on the meaning of the surname Sŏk²⁷ and dwells on the improbable dimensions of his body, which reached a height of about ten feet, while the circumference of his skull exceeded three feet.

In its second book, however, the Samguk yusa tells us the story of T'arhae according to the Karakkuk ki 駕洛國記 (Chronicles of the Kingdom of Kaya), a lost work attributed to a certain Munin 文人,²⁸ governor of Kŭmgwan 金官 (corresponding, roughly, to the area of modern-day Kimhae 金海) at the time of King Munjong 文宗 (r. 1075–85) of Koryŏ. Here the tale of T'arhae's deeds is an entirely different matter. The protagonist not only is an authentic dwarf, being only three feet tall, but he certainly does not prove to be a champion of diplomacy when, presenting himself before the king of Kaya, he tells him without much preamble that he has come to oust him.²⁹ Upon rejection of the legitimate ruler, T'arhae then challenges him to a competition in the magic arts, in which he is defeated. He then escapes from Kaya, by sea, chased by five hundred vessels, and it is on precisely that occasion that he manages to take refuge in Silla.

The episode of T'arhae conceals many interpretations within itself. What is sure, however, is that T'arhae is a character suspended between the human and the divine spheres. His aspect is supernatural, as that of a fantastic being of folk beliefs, and he is capable in sorcery too. His relationship with magpies, from which he may even have taken his surname, indicates intelligence, cunning, and even good omen. Moreover, by introducing himself as a blacksmith, he makes the king believe that he possesses divine techniques. In ancient societies, in fact, the blacksmith is a special person, a sort of magician capable of bending an elusive and dangerous element such as fire to his will. Like a shaman, the blacksmith is respected and feared and leads an existence as a homo sacer, meaning isolation from the rest of the community, being blessed and cursed at the same time. Among today's Tuareg, artisans and blacksmiths are commonly called “inadan,” a term that can be translated, more or less, as “separated.” The blacksmith is the one who forges work tools, but above all he is also the one who forges weapons, and the weapons belong to the divinity. The blacksmith himself thus becomes a divine being, like the Ἥφιστος of Greek mythology and the Tvaṣṭṛ त्वष्टृ of Indian mythology: the first anneals lightning bolts for Zeus, the second forges the vajra वज्र for Indra इन्द्र. As reported by Eliade ([1951] 2005: chap. 13), in various Asian cultures the blacksmith's profession comes immediately after that of the shaman. “Blacksmiths and shamans are of the same nest,” says a Yakut proverb. “A shaman's woman is respectable, a blacksmith's woman is venerable,” is another of these proverbs. Blacksmiths have the power to heal and even predict the future. According to the Dolgans, shamans cannot “devour” the soul of blacksmiths, because they keep it in the fire; on the other hand, it is possible for the blacksmith to take the soul of a shaman and make it burn in the fire. The blacksmiths, in turn, are perpetually threatened by evil spirits. They find themselves condemned to work continuously, to handle fire, to make an incessant noise to ward off hostile spirits.

T'arhae, therefore, presents himself as a skilled craftsman (and shaman?) capable of teaching new techniques in an era in which Silla must have been a technologically very backward kingdom. The symbology is all here: even before the divine birth and despite its foreign origin, T'arhae pretends to carry the art of iron, which is also that of weaponry, royalty, and divinity. More likely, however, T'arhae is an unscrupulous adventurer, as evidenced by the slander against Hogong, who is portrayed in other sources as a trusted royal adviser. His ascension to the throne of Silla, combined with his failure in Kaya, authorizes us to think of military events (pirate raids) subjected to the whims of fortune. After all, T'arhae comes from the sea and conquers power by deception: it is certainly the portrait of a pirate (I will reiterate this later), perhaps a sort of Chang Pogo 張保臯 (?–846) ante litteram. It is thus possible that one of his expeditions was rejected in Kaya and had more success in Silla, but we cannot know this for sure.

The next episode is very famous and is particularly loved for its romantic aspect, despite the fact that its historicity is far from proven. The protagonist is King Mu 武 (r. 600–641) of Paekche 百濟, who, wanting to marry (probably also for political reasons) Sŏnhwa 善花, royal princess of Silla, spreads a false rumor according to which the princess herself, in outrage to every female decorum, leaves the royal palace at night in order to “embrace” him. But let us leave the word to Iryŏn:

What happened next is easy to imagine: Sŏdong rushed to console the princess during her journey into exile and it was love at first sight.

The story is confusing, because it almost seems that Sŏdong married Sŏnhwa before becoming king, but the fact remains that Sŏdong has divine powers (and therefore is an authentic divine trickster) as evidenced by the enormous amount of gold he had amassed by digging roots. Later, with the help of the Buddhist Master Chimyŏng 知命, he will send that gold to king Chinp'yŏng, in order to repay him for the loss of his daughter and forge an important strategic alliance with him. Nor should it be forgotten that the Samguk yusa presents King Mu as a possible son of a dragon, as part of a process of idealization of the sovereign. In any case, in the aforementioned episode, King Mu is undoubtedly a trickster, even if a much more gallant and elegant one than T'arhae. We also begin to notice, moreover, how in the Korean stories the queen is conquered not by direct action but through a cunning used to the detriment of others. This will be one of the elements that will distinguish Korean stories from many Western stories, where cunning will be used directly against the woman.

The next trickster does not marry a princess, but in any case he conquers (and defends) an important female being, because the dragoness of the Eastern Sea can only be related to the dragon-king of the abyss. Most likely, the dragoness herself is a sea princess. However, the “simpleton” of the episode is truly sensational: the one deceived, in fact, is the King of Heaven. Here is the passage, from Haedong kosŭng chŏn 海東高僧傳:

Wŏn'gwang is a saint, and since a saint is God's favorite, for this reason he is divine. Therefore, Wŏn'gwang may be considered a divine trickster too. What is surprising, however, is that the deception is perpetrated against the Sovereign of Heaven, whereas deceptions against demons and other supernatural entities (i.e., mortals' revenge against tokkaebi, goblins, etc.) are common in many cultures. In the Christian oral tradition, there is even a narrative scheme focused on deceptions perpetrated against the devil.³³ There is, inherent in these stories, the satisfaction at having been able to exploit the power of the devil while avoiding becoming his servant. Deception, otherwise considered a reprehensible act, in this case is considered a legitimate weapon because the demon is not recognized as just any adversary: he is the enemy par excellence, considered the representation of absolute evil, and for this reason every means, lawful or unlawful, fair or unfair, becomes a potential resource for a battle that is characterized by its eschatological references. The deception has other functions too: it allows ridicule of the figure of the devil, thus exorcising his fearful role and giving greater prominence to its creator. These stories are probably aimed at reassuring believers about eternal salvation and the defeat of the forces of evil and therefore have an undoubted didactic value.

The episode of Wŏn'gwang, therefore, must be explained from the perspective of Buddhist propaganda, according to which the ruler of Heaven himself is subject to the Buddha. The Buddha himself, however, did not hesitate to resort to deception if this was done for a good purpose: the case of Hārītī हारीती, in this regard, is significant.³⁴

This kind of challenge to the sovereign of Heaven is not isolated in Korean fantasy literature, but the protagonists are often different. A similar episode is encountered in the Samguk yusa, book 4, in the chapter known as “Poyang and the Pear Tree” (Poyang imok 寶壤梨木), where we find Poyang instead of Wŏn'gwang and the dragoness is substituted by the dragon Imok 璃目,³⁵ a son of the dragon king of the sea, whose name, by an interesting (and perhaps not accidental) homophony, if written with different characters, means exactly “pear tree.” Moreover, in the classic novel Ch'oe Koun chŏn 崔孤雲傳 we find again Imok, whereas Wŏn'gwang is substituted by Ch'oe Ch'iwŏn 崔致遠 (Chŏng 2001: 99–114). The female presence reported by the Haedong kosŭng chŏn, thus, acquires particular value, and brings the episode closer to the model of the struggle for the possession of a noble woman.

No Simpleton, No Trickster (2): Three Cases from Western Mythology

Kebra nagast ክብረ ነገሥት (The Glory of the Kings) is one of the most important religious texts of Ethiopian Christianity. By an unknown author, its nucleus dates back to about the fifth century CE, and its first version was probably written in Coptic. Subsequently, the original nucleus was enriched with other elements, also passing through translations into Arabic and Ge'ez, until it was established in a definitive form in the fourteenth century. This text reports a particular version of the episode of the meeting between King Solomon and the queen of Sheba, a mysterious character already described in the Bible (1 Kings 10:1–13; 2 Chronicles 9:1–12), in the Gospels (Matthew 12:42; Luke 11:31), and in the Qur'an (27:22–44), as well as in various other Jewish, Islamic, and Christian sources.

The kingdom of Sheba has not been precisely identified, although it is often located roughly in the area of modern Yemen. As for its famous queen, she appears in the sources with various names, such as Makeda, Nikaule (Νικαύλη) (Flavius Josephus, Antiquities 8.158), or—especially in the Arab sources—Bilqīs³⁶ لقيس . The core of the story is as follows: having heard of King Solomon's great wisdom, the queen of Sheba goes to see him in order to ascertain if this is true. Having received full satisfaction, she then returns to her own kingdom. The various versions add different details from time to time, but the one that interests us most is found in the Kebra nagast. Here King Solomon, wanting to unite carnally with the queen of Sheba, devises an ingenious trick in order to possess her. Here are the main passages of the story from the translation of E. A. Wallis Budge (1922: 33–35):

Thus, thanks to King Solomon's trick, the queen of Sheba breaks her oath and is forced to have sexual intercourse with him. From this union Menelik/Menilek ምኒልክ, progenitor of all the kings of Ethiopia, was born. The deception, however, did not remain without consequences: the testimony of Kebra nagast reports how, subsequently, Menelik stole (or received from Solomon) the Ark of the Covenant, which was brought from Jerusalem to Ethiopia, where, according to a tradition, it is still hidden today.³⁷

The next episode is taken from Greek mythology. Princess Atalanta is the daughter of King Iasus of Arcadia. According to a very common theme in cultures around the globe, she is exposed at birth, because the king would have wanted a boy. The little girl, however, manages to survive and becomes a skilled hunter, until her father recognizes her as his own daughter. The king then wants to give the princess a husband, but she refuses, because an oracle had predicted that, once married, she would lose her abilities. However, she promises her father that she will only marry the one who can beat her in a running race. Any suitor who did not come out victorious would be killed by her. In this way, Atalanta systematically kills all those who come to challenge her.

Prince Melanion (also called Hippomenes) is madly in love with her, but fears being killed like the previous suitors, and so tries to win with a trick, asking for help from Aphrodite, the goddess of love. Aphrodite then gives him three golden apples from the Garden of the Hesperides, advising him to drop one at a time during the race:

The next example, the Nibelungenlied (The Song of Nibelungs), is certainly the best-known German epic. Written by an unknown author in Middle/High German at the beginning of the thirteenth century, it deals with events that took place in the fifth century, involving historical figures such as Kings Attila and Theodoric in the plot. The whole story revolves around two marriages: Gunther, king of the Burgundians, wants to marry Brunhild, the queen of Iceland. Brunhild, even if fascinating, is an authentic virago whose suitors are challenged to various contests but inevitably lose and are killed by her. Thus, King Gunther asks for the help of the hero Siegfried (who, besides having extraordinary strength and valor, is also capable of making himself invisible) to win the terrible queen; Siegfried agrees on condition that the king then gives him as wife his sister Kriemhild:

Gunther thus challenges the queen with the invisible Siegfried to help him by his side. He is thus able to overcome the duel with weapons unscathed, but then comes the crucial test: throwing a huge boulder as far as possible and then overcoming it with a leap. Gunther is worried, but here is what happens:

The trick was successful. How the story ended up, however, we will see later.

Cultural/Anthropological Implications and Final Considerations

All the aforementioned stories present strategies aimed at the possession of a woman (in the case of the master Wŏn'gwang, the possession is spiritual rather than physical) as part of a hunt for a partner, which must have had, over the millennia, more or less dramatic implications within various cultures. The stories must therefore be framed and seen in the more complex context of the man-woman relationship in antiquity and, although united by the theme of the trickster, they must be analyzed separately on the basis of the cultures that these stories have produced. And if it is true that all the women conquered in the aforementioned episodes are foreigners, it is also true that the ways in which the women are acquired are strongly affected by the cultural stratifications that over time had come to distinguish some societies from others.

I will start with the two stories that flourished in the context of Indo-European societies (Greek and Germanic), characterized by a strong exogamy, patriarchy, and initially pastoral, if not nomadic, life patterns. We notice immediately that in the two stories the women are, to use a typical police expression, “armed and dangerous,” and this should not come as a surprise even in the context of a patriarchal society such as the Indo-European one. The exogamous cultural pattern, in fact, inevitably led to frequent episodes of kidnappings or even to armed conflicts between tribes that broke out over the possession of women.⁴¹ The aforementioned case of the “Kidnapping of the Sabine Women” (Latins and Sabines/Samnites were Indo-European peoples who arrived in Italy with the so-called second migration, which took place around 1200 BCE) is a wonderful example of how the ancient Indo-European tribes must often have acted apropos of “weddings.” We should not forget, moreover, that the Trojan War also broke out over a woman. Indeed, echoes of warrior women (Amazons, Sauròmatae) have reached us through the ancient texts of history and literature (starting from Homer),⁴² and many sources agree in saying that these peoples, real or imaginary, lived in Scythia (and more precisely the steppe zone of modern-day southern Russia between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea), which is thought by various scholars to be the main area of origin of the Indo-Europeans.⁴³

Thus, the stories of Atalanta and Brunhild are struggles for life or death, even before they are love stories. Those who failed to overcome the two women would be killed, and those who won would possess them. The fact that the two women are defeated by deception, then, leads to prehistoric hunting models, whereby animals, especially potentially deadly ones, could only be conquered and captured with the help of others (Gunther and Siegfried) or by means of bait (Melanion).

Over millennia and with the creation of more complex legal systems, deception begins to be condemned, but not only this: the effects of “cultural contamination” (often due to migrations and violent conquests) are able to reverse the results of the actions perpetrated by means of tricks. This is why the stories of Brunhild and Atalanta do not have a happy ending. The epilogue of the Nibelungenlied is even terrible, becoming almost an icon of the aesthetic titanism of Germanic cultures, capable of exalting and idealizing even the greatness of tragedies. After the weddings between Gunther and Brunhild and between Siegfried and Kriemhild, everything seems to be going well until, one day, Kriemhild, during a quarrel with her sister-in-law, reveals to Brunhild the deception of which she was the victim. Brunhild then takes revenge by having Siegfried killed by the vassal Hagen (actually with the consent of Gunther), and then Kriemhild even marries Attila, king of the Huns, thinking already of revenge. In this way, as queen of his new people, she invites Gunther and his Burgundians to her court, where they will all end up massacred. Kriemhild herself kills her brother Gunther and Hagen with her own hands, and is eventually killed by an indignant Hildebrand, a vassal of the Gothic king Theodoric, who was also there as Attila's guest. The epic poem ends with a scenario of total death and destruction.

Indo-European tribalism emerges forcefully along with the concept of “feud” (not by chance a Germanic term): by marrying Attila, king of a Turkic/Mongolian people, in respect of exogamy, Kriemhild changes nationality and therefore does not have any qualms about exterminating even the people of her former tribe, including family members.

In the case of Atalanta, on the other hand, the memory of the dramatic clash of civilizations that took place between the Indo-European cultural patterns and the ancient Mediterranean civilization lingers. The Mediterranean civilization, in fact, was mainly linked to agricultural subsistence models, primarily female divinities, and endogamy. In the race against Atalanta (an Indo-European warrior woman), Melanion is helped by Aphrodite, an ancient Mediterranean goddess of love and fertility, who, like other deities (for example, Dionysus), also survived in the Indo-European pantheon. However, after marrying Atalanta, Melanion will forget the favor of the goddess and engage in absolutely indecent religious behavior, and thus the two spouses are transformed into lions, animals that, according to the beliefs of the time, did not mate with each other.

Here the cultural clash (the offense against the old Mediterranean cults and deities) is evident: according to some sources, in fact, Melanion and Atalanta were punished for having had sexual intercourse inside the temple of Cybele, another Mediterranean goddess. The conflict between the two cultures will remain latent for a long time (but in some cases is still visible today in the Mediterranean area) and will also play a major role in the birth of Greek tragedy (Untersteiner 1942).

With the episode of King Solomon and the queen of Sheba we enter a completely different context. The historical path followed by the episode raises interesting questions about the development and transformations of ancient Middle Eastern societies. In the Bible, it is the woman who goes to look for the man, in an episode that, albeit remotely, takes us back to the journey of Queen Hŏ Hwangok 許黃玉 in Korean folklore.⁴⁴ The biblical episode depicts the queen of Sheba as anything but subordinate to the Jewish king; on the contrary, the queen is placed on a level of absolute equality with Solomon. She is the queen of a rich kingdom who, out of her own cultural curiosity, goes personally to ascertain the wonderful wisdom of a distant sovereign. She is satisfied, and after having given rich gifts to the king (receiving as many in return), she simply returns to whence she came, without converting to Judaism.

The later mythography, however, shows a completely different picture. The queen is now almost a demonic being: she is hairy and even has a donkey's (or goose's) foot. The relationship with King Solomon is no longer one of equality but of subordination, both political and religious. This must certainly be connected to the male chauvinist turn that took place within the so-called revealed religions in the early centuries of the Common Era. This is certainly not the place to explore an extremely complex phenomenon like this; I will only remember the degradation (if not the disappearance) of the feminine element that the philosophy of the time (Gnosticism, above all) had exalted. The Supreme Wisdom, called Sophia Σοφία in Greek and Ruah רוח in Hebrew, loses ground, and what was originally the Mother of the Christian Trinity becomes an ambiguous Holy Spirit (πνɛῦµα ἅγιον). The female element seen as essential to reach Heaven resurfaces in the late Middle Ages, thanks to the reinterpretation and reworking of the old Greek texts by Arabo-Persianate culture. This phenomenon reaches Europe, where it sees (at least in literature) the woman as a spiritual guide, materializing, for example, in Dante's Beatrice and in Shākh-e Nabāt شاخه نبات, the muse of Hāfez حافظ.

Kebra nagast's queen of Sheba could be the result of this revaluation. Thus, the queen yields to King Solomon only by deception and, in any case, she becomes the progenitor of the Ethiopian royal dynasty that will be able to place itself on a level of superiority over the Israelites by obtaining the Ark of the Covenant.

In Korean stories, by contrast, women play a much more passive role, becoming above all (unlike what happens in the Western episodes mentioned above) a political/diplomatic instrument. This implies a more evolved context within an already masculinized society and, therefore, a possibly later codification of the stories, in opposition to other episodes such as, for example, that of Ondal 溫達 (?–590),⁴⁵ where the woman has a predominant role.⁴⁶ It is also for this reason that, as has already been said, the deception is not perpetrated directly toward women but toward those around them. The episode of T'arhae certainly lends itself to many interpretations, but a cross-analysis of the chronicles of Silla and Kaya reveals further evidence of how eventful the protohistoric period may have been in the area between northeastern China and the Japanese archipelago. Sea voyages in both directions (Korea–Japan, Korea–Northeast Asia, and vice versa) must have been frequent, in the context of a culture that presented very similar aspects (e.g., jar burials and southern-type dolmens) in the south of the Korean peninsula and on the island of Kyūshū. Thus, there must have been local migrations of people in search of fortunes to be obtained by more or less legitimate means. Episodes like that of Yŏno 延烏⁴⁷ and Seo 細烏 of Hogong and, of course, of T'arhae must certainly be framed in this context.

But T'arhae's place of provenience remains unknown. Very interesting, in this regard, is Yi Hyŏngu's intuition that the migration of T'arhae could be connected in some way to the migration of Chumong (Yi H. 1994: esp. 20–22).⁴⁸ I feel I can support a similar hypothesis because, in this way, T'arhae and his entourage would come from the continent, where the iron civilization had already evolved, and therefore they could certainly have used their technological experiences as a calling card to gain hospitality in Silla. Another possible scenario could be that T'arhae was originally a Kaya man, expelled for some reason from his own country.

T'arhae directly challenges King Suro in a magic contest that suggests the role of king-shaman that the tribe chieftains of the time must have had. More likely, his must have been a full-scale military attack, thwarted by the ruler of Kaya, who has him chased by five hundred ships, whereupon, defeated, he abandons the enterprise and flees by sea. Five hundred ships are never used (even if the number is clearly hyperbolic) to pursue a single person, and this confirms that T'arhae's must have been a pirate raid. It is also possible that this story was invented in the context of the nobility of old Kaya, which came to light especially after the end of the sŏnggol 聖骨 aristocracy: however, if we remove the inevitable exaggerations, it does not seem completely absurd.

After failing in Kaya, T'arhae tries again in Silla, this time with deception, and succeeds, to the detriment of Hogong, who had also come by sea. T'arhae is probably content to keep a low profile for the moment, waiting diplomatically for a better time to gain the throne, and in the meantime gets rid of Hogong, who may have been a dangerous competitor.⁴⁹ T'arhae is aware that he can wait because he evidently knows that in Silla a son-in-law, instead of a daughter, can become king. As for Hogong (whom we later find as T'arhae's own officer), he too may have been a former adventurer in the service of the king of Silla.

What is certain is that, thanks to deception, T'arhae becomes a precursor, in Korea, of the theme of “son-in-law who becomes king,” which is widespread in Western mythology and probably has the same origin, which is that of matriarchy and/or matrilineage replaced by the patriarchy.⁵⁰ In this regard, the protohistoric era must have been decisive in Korea, and typical patterns of matriarchy/matrilineage such as endogamy must have survived for a long time, if it is true that Kim Yusin 金庾信 (595–673) gets to marry his own niece.

The King Mu episode certainly happens in the historical period, but this has not served to dispel many doubts about its authenticity. The document found in the Mirŭksa 彌勒寺 pagoda, in 2009, does not mention Sŏnhwa as queen but as Sat'aek 沙宅 (that is, a lady from the Sa clan), but this does not exclude that King Mu may have had more than one queen.⁵¹ Furthermore, we do not know how much a Silla queen could be loved in Paekche, and therefore many inscriptions may have been voluntarily reticent.⁵²

King Mu's trick is usually explained by the fact that at that time the relations between Paekche and Silla were already very strained. This may be true, but if so then King Mu would have no reason to enrich an enemy king with his gold (although this is probably a fantastic detail), unless his was a risky political move aimed at improving relations between the two states. In addition, placing the daughter of an enemy king in his own home could have meant, for Mu, both holding a hostage and keeping a spy, and we don't know if the king of Paekche wanted to take such a risk.

It is therefore possible that the episode has something to do with the customs of the peoples of that time. As part of the endogamy of the ruling aristocracy of Silla, marrying a princess of that country should not have been easy; besides, at the beginning of the seventh century, the sŏnggol were already starting to run out. This must have been a common opinion in other states as well, meaning that Mu's deception could have served to circumvent the social taboo with the greatest joy of its population. It cannot even be ruled out that, by flaunting a queen of Silla, King Mu intended to make a good impression on China, which, at the time of the episode, had yet to be ruled by the Sui 隨 (581–618) and was on a full collision course with Koguryŏ.

From the point of view of fairytale narrative, King Mu's trick suggests that the “predestination” of his own kingship⁵³ (if there was one) does not also include the acquisition of a queen of Silla. On the contrary, to have Sŏnhwa (and a possible alliance with Silla) the king must use all his wits, personally and on his own initiative.

In short, behind the fictional love of Mu and Sŏnhwa (assuming that there really was a marriage), as eternalized in the Sŏdong-yo 薯童謠, the presence of a political motive is always the most probable. The ingenious trick remains but, as they say, anything goes in love and war, and for Paekche, love and war were never so closely connected as in that moment.

Finally, the episode of Master Wŏn'gwang. Technically it is very similar to that of the queen of Sheba: a woman of high lineage learns of a man's wisdom and visits him. But the similarity does not end there. Like the story of Solomon, the female character first takes on fantastic connotations (dragoness) and then even disappears from the scene. It is obvious that Buddhist masters must have had women among believers, and in a period when literacy was very rare, the only women capable of fully understanding a sermon had to be the most educated and therefore, at least theoretically, the most aristocratic ones. As a matter of fact, women (and not only in the East)⁵⁴ have always been particularly receptive to salvific religions, and the case of Korean Buddhism is no exception. The popularization of Buddhism through the use of a simple and theatrical language, maximized by Wŏnhyo 元曉 (617–86), was precisely aimed at attracting believers from the lower classes, and women represented the majority, not least because they led a more sedentary life. Wŏn'gwang's dragoness, therefore, must have been a woman in all respects, whom we find already demonized in Haedong kosŭng chŏn and even replaced by Imok in subsequent literature, in the context of an increasingly militant patriarchy and moralism.⁵⁵ In any case, saving the woman/dragon, Wŏn'gwang definitely conquers an important believer and proclaims the universality of Buddhism and its superiority (which also legitimizes the Royal House of Silla) over local cults and beliefs, starting with the ruler of Heaven, who is ignominiously duped.

In conclusion, the trickster motif belongs to what structuralist philosophers call mankind's “reptile brain” or “deep brain structure,” meaning that it can be found in human nature even before culture (Laborit 1971). For this reason, it exists in every part of the world. To this innate motif, the cultural stratifications of each civilization add a series of different aspects and nuances to the form, the practice, and the purpose of the trick itself. By overcoming the scientific limits of pure phenomenology, which often stops at the mere observation of the similarity of phenomena, structuralism aims to demonstrate that, when faced with the same situation, all human beings tend to react in the same way (the “nature” of the reptilian brain), but in different aesthetic forms (the “culture” of the structured brain) according to the various cultural contexts. In this way, structuralism overcomes phenomenology and at the same time leads us to the kind of historical-cultural investigation which is also associated with the phenomenological method, pointing out from time to time those variants of the same phenomenon that are the result of cultural stratification.⁵⁶ What we have seen in this article have been variations on the theme of “conquering” a woman, but it is obvious that the theme of the trickster can be extended almost indefinitely. What was important to demonstrate is that all human beings live “under the same sky,” in the sense that, beyond linguistic, religious, and political differences, there remains in the world a universal language, understandable to everyone, which, if correctly applied, can still help mankind to travel a long way.

This work was supported by a Humanities Korea Plus Project through the Ministry of Education of the Republic of Korea and the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF-2019S1A6A3A03058791).

Notes

References