Goryeo Dynasty System

Timeline

1. 1371–1374Gaesong royal palace · North Hwanghae ProvinceAfter King Gongmin took personal rule, he reorganized the jeonchaegye, abolished powerful factions, and restored the imperial examinations; the Menha-seong and Zhongshu-sheng again received memorials. Around 1371 the court attempted to weaken aristocratic factions and use the civil official system to check military officers; the functions of the central Six Ministries and Three Offices were temporarily strengthened during the reforms.
2. 1374–1377Gaesong · North Hwanghae ProvinceAfter King Gongmin's death, the young King U and powerful ministers such as Yi Myeong-deok and Im Chun, along with the Wang consort kin, controlled court politics. The Three Offices nominally still held deliberative and remonstrance powers, but in practice decisions largely came from the private residences of powerful factions. In the mid-1370s, official appointments, military command allocation, and diplomacy toward Ming were all constrained by aristocratic factional strife, and royal power and censorial functions were severely hollowed out.
3. 1378–1380Gaesong Six Ministries office district · North Hwanghae ProvinceBy around 1378, the Six Ministries of Personnel, Revenue, Rites, War, Justice, and Works, as well as the Dugam-bu, still handled routine affairs such as household registration and tax labor, rituals and examinations, military administration and judicial matters; the local magsa and myeongma-sa systems continued to operate. The institutional shell remained, but central authority was in decline, planting an institutional crisis that would later lead to the military coup by Yi Seong-gye's faction.