Status of court ladies in Jewel in the Palace

The blurry line between fact and fiction in historical dramas fascinates me. But while there may be artistic licence, the settings have to be fairly historically accurate to make the story believable. The shenanigans of the court ladies in Jewel in the Palace drive the plot. So who are court ladies in Jewel in the Palace? What is their status in the Joseon Court? And how does Jang Geum break all the rules?!

In this post:

• Who was Dae Jang Geum?
• How Jang Geum breaks away from the female hierarchy in King Jungjong’s palace
• Confucian values: status and the virtuous woman vs sex slaves

related posts:

Jewel in the Palace Recaps

Who was Dae Jang Geum?

Dae Jang Geum was a historical figure who lived in the mid-Joseon period. Her name appears in the annals of Joseon as King Jungjong’s doctor which makes her the first and only woman to treat a Joseon monarch.

There is little else known about Dae Jang Geum, so the story itself is fiction. Director Lee Byeong-hoon wrote about making the drama in his book and why he chose to make the theme about food.

Dae Jang Geum in Jewel in the Palace

In the drama, Jang Geum starts her life in the palace as a child where she trains to become a court lady in the palace kitchens. Then she becomes a female medical practitioner (which is inferior to a court lady).

However, by the end of the drama, she is promoted to the king’s personal physician. (level 3 government official). This position takes her above the usual rank possible for a court lady in Joseon. So the whole court is outraged. After all, there are strict and separate ranking systems (with 9 levels) for men and women.

The official-scholars gather outside the palace begging the king to change his mind. The doctors write letters of resignation in disgust. Even the female practitioners chastise Jang Geum for drawing attention to herself.

They argue that it is not possible for a woman to receive the same rank as a man. Only men can become government officials and the court must keep social order, otherwise there will be chaos. Keeping social order means that everyone must know their place and how to behave. Social class, gender, and age all play a part.

So let’s start by looking at the hierarchy of the court ladies in Jewel in the Palace.

See the 9 level ranking system for the court ladies

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1. Hierarchy of Court Ladies in Jewel in the Palace

The queen is in charge of all the ladies at court. She oversees the female servants, court ladies, and concubines.

So she has a lot of authority at court, especially if her son is the crown prince. But in Jewel in the Palace Queen Munjeong’s position is politically fragile as there already is a crown prince: the son of the king’s first queen.

In the drama, the Queen tries to persuade Jang Geum (episode 49) to kill the current crown prince. (future King Injong r.1544-1545 who died in mysterious circumstances and there were rumours that Queen Munjeong was to blame)

Historically, Queen Munjeong went on to reign as Regent when her son (King Meongjong was too young).

Court Ladies in Jewel in the Palace

The Queen Mother

The strongest influence in the palace of all the women is the queen mother.

As the mother of the king she has the highest status, but she is not supposed to be involved in politics. But in drama she can be persuasive and even resort to emotional blackmail.

Filial piety is very important in Confucianism and King Jungjong doesn’t want to go against his mother’s wishes. The government officials also know this and use her to their advantage.

Read more about status and ways to address members of the Royal Court

Court Ladies in Jewel in the Palace

Entry level Court Ladies

From the very beginning of the drama we can see that hierarchy is important.

As soon as the girls join the court, they have to recite all the ranks of the court ladies in order. Although there are nine levels, there are several titles for each one. They start with Bin, the highest ranking concubine:

“Bi, Bin, Gwiin, Soui, Sugui, Soyong, Sugyong, Sowon, Sugwon, Sanggung, sangui, sangbok, sangsik, sangchim, sanggong, sangjeong, sanggi, jeonbin, jeonui, jeonseon, jeonseol, jeonje, jeoneon, jeonchan, jeonsik, yeongsa, daejehak, jehak, bujehak, jeonhan, eunggyo, bueunggyo, gyori, bugyori, suchan, busuchan” ..

It seems that the girls must ‘know their place’ from an early age. And right now they are at the bottom of the court lady hierarchy. However, court ladies rank above female doctors and servants.

Which class are the court ladies in Jewel in the Palace?

The ladies in court are selected as children from ‘good’ middle and upper class families. So even though the girls all start at the bottom of the hierarchy and so in terms of court lady rankings  are technically the same level, they still create their own mini hierarchy by checking each other’s family backgrounds.

Jang Geum is looked down on when she arrives at the palace. The other girls call her a peasant. But she’s afraid to tell them that her father was a military guard in court and her mother was a court lady since they told her NEVER to mention this.

Even the Choi ladies are not immune to the stigma of class.

In episode 1 lady Choi is a young kitchen lady and is reminded by the head kitchen lady (her aunt) that as their family is only middle class and not yangban, their jobs at court are the best positions they can possibly hope for in life.

Whilst Lady Choi’s uncle is a merchant, the women in the family have held the top kitchen lady’s position for 5 generation and they have learnt that to keep this position they must take sides with those who are in power. And they sometimes have to play dirty to keep their positions. They console themselves with the fact that they may not be yangban but at least they have money and power!

 When Lady Choi loses the cooking competition to Lady Han, she is desperate to get her place back. So she uses the excuse of class to try to get Lady Han fired from the Head Kitchen Lady position.

She gets the other court ladies to turn against Lady Han by saying they can not serve under her as she is of lowly birth (her mother worked in a gisaeng house and was raped by a yangban) The queen mother agrees that Lady Han’s low social status is a problem and that Lady Choi is a more suitable choice for Head Kitchen Lady as she, at least, is middle class.

Court Ladies in Jewel in the Palace

The Head Court Lady (제조상궁'(提調尙宮)

On the 9 level ranking system, Court Ladies can only be promoted up to a level 5 – Sang-gung. (Above this are the concubines.)

At the top of rank 5 is the Head Court Lady. The Head Court Lady overseas all the court lady affairs and reports directly to the queen. The Head of the Royal Kitchens is also a powerful position.

And of course the Choi family women have managed to hold these two prime jobs for the last 5 generations!

These top positions of the Court Ladies in Jewel in the Palace are very fragile. When the leader goes down, everyone suffers. Remember when Lady Han and Jang Geum are exiled from the palace? After that, all the ladies associated with Lady Han suffer under Lady Choi.

Then later when Jang Geum comes back as a doctor, she finds her old friends have been demoted to maids who look after the king’s bath water and toilet. They complain that they have never seen the king’s face, just his backside!

Court Ladies in Jewel in the Palace

Special Court Ladies

The role of the court ladies is to serve the king through the smooth running of the palace. So most of the court ladies don’t meet the king directly.

Usually, the only way to move higher in the ranks than a level 5 court lady is to become a concubine. This happens to Jang Geum’s friend Yeon-saeng when she is noticed by the king. Sleeping with the king entitles the court lady to a special court lady status (sungun sang-gung 승은상궁). Whilst this is not quite concubine status, there is possibility of promotion if she can provide a child.

In Jewel in the Palace, we see that Yeon-saeng now wears grander clothes and doesn’t have to work in the kitchens anymore.

But her new status is pretty meaningless. She has no servants herself and the other kitchen ladies don’t respect her at all. However, everything changes when she becomes pregnant and is promoted to a concubine – Suk-Won. Now she is given two attendants to look after her. Court ladies who were once her peers, now have to bow to her!

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Read more about status and ways to address members of the Royal Court

Court Ladies in Jewel in the Palace

Concubines

There can only be one queen (at a time), but there can be several concubines and special court ladies. And they have a high status in the court lady hierarchy as they can wield influence over the king.

Concubines don’t feature too heavily in Jewel in the Palace. (King Sukjong is the king famous for his concubines)

A concubine position was a respected one. So when the whole court is against Jang Geum becoming the king’s doctor, a solution is offered: the king should make Jang Geum his concubine!

The government officials are enthusiastic about this suggestion. Because this promotion is a socially acceptable position for a woman. Of course this also means that she wouldn’t be able to work as a doctor. Luckily for her, the king doesn’t make her his concubine!

2. Confucian values: virtuous woman vs sex slaves

Yeollyo 열녀 The Virtuous Woman

Another role of the court ladies is to uphold Confucian values. It is an important part of keeping the social order that women behave properly. This means they must remain virtuous and pure.

We see this from the very beginning of the drama as soon as Jang Geum enters the royal court. All the girls join the palace when they are 4 or 5 years old and take a ‘test’ to make sure they are still virgins.

The blood of a parrot is put on the child’s hand and if the blood doesn’t run then she is still a virgin! But since the girls are so young, the test is merely a ritual probably to enforce in the girls how important it is to remain pure. They have to ‘make sure’ that the girls are all virgins before they can even be accepted into the palace.

Once accepted as virgins they are told that they are the king’s women and are not allowed to ‘commit adultery’ which includes not even thinking of other men. Anyone who breaks this rule will be punished in the ‘secret court lady way’ – forced to drink poison.

Punishments by poison

We are given two examples to show that this is not just a threat.

In episode 1 we see Lady Park (Jang Geum’s future mother) framed by Lady Choi who says she has ‘witnesses’ Lady Park fraternising with a royal guard. This is illegal in the court and Lady Park is smuggled out of the palace by the head court lady and forced to drink poison. She is only saved by an antidote given to her by her friend Lady Han. The other ladies are warned that this will happen to them too if they ‘commit adultery’.

Another reminder comes in episode 8 in the mandu dumplings episode where Jang Geum ends up in a predicament when her flour is stolen right before a cooking competition.

The girl who stole her flour is a seamstress who shares her room. But when we hear her story, it’s hard to be angry about the flour…

She wanted to make mandu dumplings as a final meal for her mother before she retired from the palace.

But the truth is that the old court lady is not her biological mother. Her mother was a young kitchen lady who was raped by an envoy and became pregnant. Regardless of her lack of consent, the young woman was no longer ‘pure’, so after giving birth she was forced to commit suicide. And the baby was brought up in secrecy within the court by other ladies.

Joseon values intensified in the palace

The treatment of women in the Royal Court is particularly strict as they are serving the king.

But this ideal of yollyo continued throughout Joseon society and became particularly noticeable during the Imjin and Manchu invasions when many women in Joseon were raped by the invaders.

Rather than remain alive and stain the reputation of their family, these women often committed suicide and were honoured posthumously for their noble action!  A dishonoured lady could not marry well and married women could be disowned by their husbands if they were kidnapped or raped by foreign invaders.

The kings at the time, King Seonjo (r.1567-1608) and then Gwanghaegun (r.1608-1623), tried to stop this practice.

Needless to say, men and women could not fraternise freely. And any kind of relationship at court was taboo.

So it’s no wonder that Jang Geum’s growing romance with military officer Min Jung Ho must be kept secret. If anyone finds out, he will be fired and she will be killed! (Notably, a much worse punishment for her than for him!)

So the jealous Choi Geum Young (who is in love with Sir Min) can threaten to reveal their relationship if Sir Min continues to investigate her unscrupulous uncle, Merchant Choi. Therefore, Sir Min has no choice but to give in to her blackmail.

I feel bad for Geum Young though. Her love is so innocent since court ladies had to remain virgins their whole life – unless they left the palace or became the King’s concubine. (See Dong Yi, MBC 2010 for the story of the low class girl who becomes King Sukjong’s concubine)

Virtuous women in Joseon history

Outside the palace, married women were also expected to continue a morally pure life. The ideal was to support the husband and family and become the ‘good wife, wise mother’. The most famous woman in Joseon history who represents this ideal is Shin Saimdang  (1504-1551) (who appears on the 50,000 won note).

Actress Lee Yeong-ae also plays Shin Saimdang in the drama Saimang, Memoirs of Colours (SBS 2017)

Where is the home of renowned artist Shin Saimdang?

Low Status Female Medical Practitioners

On the other hand, once Jang Geum becomes a female medical practitioner she is not classified as a Court Lady. Her position is below the court ladies and comes with new challenges.

Whilst male doctors in the Joseon period had a relatively high status, they were lower than scholars and military officials. We can see this in the medical drama Heojun too. But of course female medical practitioners were much lower.

Even before Jang Geum joins the royal pharmacy, we see the real discrimination that women doctors face in the outside world. In episode 32 she cures a young yangban boy. But his father is against a woman treating his son since all the male doctors have already failed.

And when Jang Geum enters the Royal Pharmacy we discover that there is very little respect for female doctors here either.

The court ladies treat the female doctors like servants calling on them to to massage their aching feet!

Geum Young, Jang Geum’s old rival and now Head Kitchen Lady, tries to humiliate her by making her massage her feet, but it seems to backfire when Jang Geum massages her feet and can diagnose all her health problems.

The female medical practitioners look after the female members of the royal family and the court ladies. But this is simply a practical necessity since male doctors can’t enter a lady’s room due to the strict codes of conduct between men and women.

But when there is a serious illness, the male doctors take over. A bamboo curtain is put up between the patient and doctor so that he can give advice through the curtain.

Sex Slaves

One benefit of being a court lady is that they are in a sense ‘married’ to the king. So they are spared the danger of becoming a sex slave!

Unfortunately, this is not the case for the medical staff.

The Confucian Classics teacher teacher (episode 34) wants to make the female medical students into sex slaves for guests at an officials event.

We learn that this practice started during Yeonsangun’s reign but is a habit that is hard to stop now. Only Jang Geum and her friend Shin Bi turn up for Dr Shin’s class since all the other ladies were persuaded to go and entertain the officials. To make things worse the Confucian Classics teacher then tries to FAIL the two students for refusing to become prostitutes!

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So to sum up

In this post I looked at the status and roles of the court ladies. The ladies at court had their own ranking system separate to men and they were expected to stay within it. They were also supposed to follow certain behaviour which included remaining chaste and not becoming involved with any men except the king.

Jang Geum manages to break both of these rules. First off all, she is promoted to a level usually reserved for men. She also falls in love with Sir Min Jung Ho when she should stay faithful to the king!

She succeeds by standing out and rising above societal restrictions. And that makes for an uplifting and exciting story!

Jewel in the Palace Recaps

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Some of the information in this post I read in Women and Confucianism in Chosun Korea; New Perspectives edited by Youngmin Kim and Michael J. Pettid (2011, published by Suny)