The royal books taken from Ganghwa Island

On 16 October 1866, a large French military force attacked Ganghwa city, on an island off Korea’s west coast, and took it with almost no resistance. The Korea Times, in an account that quotes a French eyewitness, says the soldiers then looted the armoury, the storehouses, the silver and the library. The Korea Herald and the Korea Times say the attack answered the execution of French Catholic missionaries by the Joseon authorities, the ruling government of Korea.

The library was the Oegyujanggak. King Jeongjo had built it in 1782 as an annex of the royal library, to protect the royal archives. The National Museum of Korea says it held the uigwe, hand-written and hand-painted records of royal ceremonies. Many are the only copy that survives. The Korea Herald reports that the French took 297 volumes, with silverware and other royal objects. Trafficking Culture, an academic encyclopedia, cites a news agency chronology that says the library building was burned.

The volumes went to the Bibliothèque nationale de France, the national library in Paris, and were catalogued as Chinese documents. In 1975 a Korean-born librarian there found them. The National Museum of Korea says their location was first verified that year with her help. The Korea JoongAng Daily reports that France held the books to be legitimate spoils of war and refused to return them. Korea began to press for their return in 1991, and Trafficking Culture says French law lists such books as national treasures and does not allow their transfer abroad. In September 1993 the French president returned one volume during a visit to Seoul and promised to return the rest.

A Seoul civic group, Cultural Action, took the national library to a Paris administrative court. Sources give the year of the filing as 2007 or 2008. Trafficking Culture reports that the court rejected the claim in December 2009. It accepted that the books had been taken illegally, but held that this did not stop them from being French national property.

The way out came at the G20 summit in Seoul on 12 November 2010. An aide to the South Korean president said the French president had agreed to return the books “on a five-year renewable lease basis”, as the Korea JoongAng Daily reports. An agreement was signed on 7 February 2011. The museum and the library concluded the practical terms in Paris on 16 March 2011. The 297 volumes came in four shipments. The first, of 75 volumes, landed at Incheon on 14 April 2011, and the last arrived on 27 May 2011.

France kept ownership. Most reports call the arrangement a five-year renewable loan. One Korea Times report, in February 2011, called it a permanent lease that is renewed every five years. Trafficking Culture reports that, because the books are on loan, they cannot be classed as Korean national cultural heritage. The Korea Times reports that the librarian who found the books did not accept a loan and wanted full return. She died in Paris in November 2011, aged 83. On 31 October 2022 the Korea Times said the books came on a five-year renewable lease in 2011, and that the museum was holding an exhibition of about 460 items, with all 297 books, to mark ten years since the return. No renewal date has been reported.