Defender of Heunghwajin who harried the retreating Khitans in 1011, freeing some 30,000 captives before he fell
During the second Khitan invasion he held Heunghwajin to the end and recaptured Gwakju. As the Khitan withdrew, he and Kim Suk-heung fought them repeatedly and rescued captives being taken away, but he was killed fighting the main army of Emperor Shengzong.
The Khitan Liao invaded Goryeo three times between 993 and 1019. Goryeo repelled them through Seo Hui’s diplomacy and Gang Gam-chan’s victory at Gwiju.
Emperor Shengzong of Liao invaded with 400,000 men and took Gaegyeong; King Hyeonjong fled to Naju, and Yang Gyu harried the retreating enemy and freed captives.
Dramatized works (films, dramas, novels) may differ from the historical record.
Eighth king of Goryeo, who weathered the second and third Khitan invasions and began the first Tripitaka
Khitan emperor who personally led 400,000 troops into Goryeo in 1010, using Gang Jo’s coup as a pretext
Sixth king of Goryeo, who adopted Choe Seung-ro’s 28-article memorial and built a Confucian central and local administration
Statesman who negotiated with Xiao Sunning in 993 and won the six garrisons east of the Yalu
Commander-in-chief who won the Battle of Gwiju in 1019 and proposed the outer wall of Gaegyeong
Northwestern commander who deposed Mokjong in 1009; captured and killed by the Khitans at Tongju in 1010
The age when the civil-minded Song bought peace from Liao, Western Xia and Jin while the lower Yangtze boomed and Neo-Confucianism took shape, and the Ming, having driven out the Yuan, rebuilt the East Asian order through imperial autocracy, the sea ban and tribute — as Japan passed through the Kamakura and Muromachi warrior governments into the Warring States era, and Korea from Goryeo to Joseon