Korea of bygone days

Kiadó: Terebess Kiadó
Szerző:Peter Vay
Előszó:Fendler Károly
Szerkesztő:Birtalan Ágnes

There aren’t many foreign eyewitness descriptions of how Korea looked like a hundred years ago. The present book, written by a Hungarian Roman Catholic priest is one of them. Count Peter Vay, member of a Hungarian noble family, traveled extensively in the Far East as an envoy of Pope Leo XIII after the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-95 and around the Russian-Japanese War of 1904-05. Incorporating parts of Empires and Emperors of Russia, China, Korea and Japan, published by John Murray in London, 1906, the volume gives a vivid account of his impressions of Korean life and events of those dramatic years. For those interested in the subject, his minute descriptions of town life, traditions and customs of the people, will prove an invaluable source. Having seen the effects of earlier Chinese, then Russian, and finally Japanese dominance and occupation the author had the conviction nevertheless that the „Korean people and Korea have an important role to play in the future”. Subsequent history of the Land of the Morning Calm, as the country is sometimes lovingly referred to, has proved his prophecy to be true.