The Imjin War was one of the bloodiest conflicts in human history. Hundreds of thousands were killed. Hundreds of thousands were enslaved. Entire regions were depopulated – former provincial capitals turned into ghost towns. In this episode there is weeping without end; pain without ceasing. An entire people abused and mistreated. This is the story of that conflict – The Imjin War.
It’s all here and it’s all free on Battlecast – the world’s foremost podcast on war and its sociopolitical impact.
This is part four of a four part series. You can find part one here; part two here; and part three here.
Download episode 61 here
Maps and Illustrations:
References:
Samurai invasion: Japan’s Korean war by Stephen Turnbull (2002)
Book of Corrections: Reflections on the National Crisis During the Japanese Invasion of Korea, 1592-1598 by Song-Nyong Yu and Byonghyon Choi
Imjin changch’o: Admiral Yi Sun-sin’s memorials to court by Sun-sin Yi. Translated by Ha Tse-hung
Admiral Yi Sun-sin of Korea by Jong-dae Kim. Translated by Philip K Rhyu
Nanjung Ilgi: War Diary of Admiral Yi Sun-sin by Yi Sun-shin. Translated by Ha Tae-hung.
A history of Korea: from “Land of the Morning Calm” to states in conflict by Jinwung Kim
A concise history of Korea: from antiquity to the present by Michael Seth
A concise history of Japan by Brett Walker
The Cambridge history of Japan volumes 3 and 4 edited by Kozo Yamamura and John Whitney Hall
The Imjin War by Samuel Hawley
The samurai invasion of Korea by Stephen Turnbull
A dragon’s head and a serpent’s tail: Ming China and the First Great East Asian War, 1592-1598 by Swope, Kenneth M. (2009)
The Japanese experience by W.G. Beasley
The Hagakure by Yamamoto Tsunetomo, translated by William Scott Wilson
Samurai wisdom by Thomas Cleary
A history of Japan by R.H.P. Mason and J.G. Caiger
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