DISINTEGRA TlON OF THE EARLY CHaSON 69signs of hardship. Impoverished peasants became more mobile as they moved
out of their native villages, some moving to commercial towns or turning to ban-
ditry as the best means of earning a living. Even private slaves began to take to
the road to escape oppression in the 1550s, and slaveowners began to complain
that the old standards of respect had been lost. 21
Radical Reform Proposals IgnoredA number of officials responded to this situation by harking back once again to
the well-field system of the ancient Chou, which would have required the nation-
alization of all land and redistribution to the peasantry, or to the land limitation
scheme first attempted in the Han dynasty in China, but in every instance these
proposals were opposed or ignored. In IS I 8 Yu Ok conceded that the situation
did not warrant the implemention ofthe Chou well-field model for granting square
plots of 100 myo of land each to eight families who would then volunteer their
labor on a ninth plot for the benefit of the state (in place of the feudal lord of
the ancient Chou dynasty). He did propose consideration of the land limitation
scheme of the Han dynasty or the equal-field system of the Northern Wei and
T'ang dynasties to eliminate disparities oflandownership and wealth.21
In 1519 King Chungjong rejected Ki Chun's proposal to adopt the well-field
model because the land was not flat or broad enough to layout even fields in
squares. Ki responded by proposing a land limitation system, but ChOng Sun-
myong stymied further consideration by pointing out that a recent proposal for
a 50-kyollimit was far too large to be realistic because of the population pres-
sure in areas like Kyongsang Province. A more modest limit of IO kyol was unre-
alistic, he continued, because that amount was beyond the reach of the ordinary
peasant to obtain even in provinces like Kyonggi.^23 The debate ended that day
without further discussion for lower limits, probably bceause resistance to con-
fiscation by the larger landlords would have been too powerful to overcome.
In 1524 Nam Kon agreed that the situation at that time did not warrant the
adoption of either the well-field or equal-field system, but he argued that the
king was at least obliged to implement the law that required a resurvey of cul-
tivated land every twenty years to provide for accurate taxation of land that had
been brought under cultivation and exemption for that which had been aban-
doned. Noting that in Hwanghae Province alone a cadastral survey had not been
carried out for fifty-four years, many peasants were still being dunned for taxes
even though they had long since sold their land to others, while reclaimers of
new land had ncver been registered to pay any taxes. King Chungjong agreed
that whenever crop conditions improved, it would be possible to carry out a new
survey, but the governor of Hwanghae and the court officials blocked the pro-
posal, and it died without action.^24
Despite the growth of agricultural production and productivity by the end of
the sixtcenth century, a crisis had developed by the malclistribution of wealth.
The large landlords and slaveholders received rents from their commoner and