The Great Compendium of Administration (of the Joseon Dynasty) (Gyeongguk daejeon)

The Great Compendium of Administration was the standard code of the Joseon Dynasty. King Sejo (r. 1455- 1468) ordered the initial compilation of the previously issued regulations, and then the code was revised during the age of King Yejong (r. 1468-1469), and eventually King Seonjong (r. 1469-1494) proclaimed the completion of the codes. Once the legal system was established with the completion of The Great Compendium of Administration , formal documentation, for both personal and official use, was required for all legal activity, including exercising one’s property rights. According to the “Clause on Private Slaves” in the Penal Code of The Great Compendium of Administration , the transmission of property from both the maternal and paternal side of the family (including grandparents, parents, maternal grandparents and the parents of one’s wife) to any of their descendants required documentation. However, when property was transferred to those outside the family, documents required an official government seal.
The basic principle of property inheritance required equal distribution among all offspring with the exception of the eldest son. The eldest son, as ritual heir, was entitled to an additional inheritance equal to one-fifth of one offspring’s share. For offspring of concubines, oneseventh of the legitimate offspring’s share went to the offspring of commoner-status concubines; for offspring of concubines of low status, the share was reduced to an even smaller one-tenth. Such records in the The Great Compendium of Administration reveal that legislation of proper property inheritance was established in the early Joseon period, details of which were in effect up to the seventeenth century.