2. Unified Silla - Centralized Control of Land
Population increase required the transition from a tribal
alliance to a central state. This unification took place in
668 A.D. and led to the development of a sophisticated administration
with ministries for functional fields and hierarchical offices
for provinces, kuns, and hyons. This weakened the tribal chiefs
and strengthened the state and its bureaucrats who were selected
not according to qualification as in China, but according
to the bone-rank system. They did not prove to be very efficient.
The effect on the land was the nationalization of control
over land instead of group control, and, in time, a continuous
transition to private control by the king's followers and
bureaucrats. They became wealthy and powerful and exploited
the peasants. Actually, when the king allotted land to his
followers, this only meant the right to manage the land and
collect the tax, but often the king could not control encroachments
by the aristocracy against the peasants. The system collapsed
when, in exceptional cases, full private control was granted,
i.e., tax and land rights. This was granted for merit and,
in the case of newly cultivated land, to the cultivator. These
exceptions opened the door to illegal actions, and the aristocrats
brought more and more land under their control thus reducing
the revenue of the state. The peasants were oppressed and
lived in misery so that, at the end of the Silla period, in
918, many left the land, and production came to a standstill.
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