کد مقاله | کد نشریه | سال انتشار | مقاله انگلیسی | نسخه تمام متن |
---|---|---|---|---|
5056792 | 1476555 | 2017 | 7 صفحه PDF | دانلود رایگان |
- Heights of Korean militiamen measured from the 16th to 18th century are analyzed.
- Mean height of pre-modern Korean men was tentatively estimated at 166Â cm.
- Pre-modern men are taller by 1Â cm than North Koreans.
- Pre-modern men are shorter by 6Â cm than South Koreans.
This paper extends the research on the biological standard of living in the Korean peninsula back to pre-modern times. Drawing on militia rosters of the ChosÅn Dynasty from the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries, we tentatively conclude that the final height of Korean men during this period was 166Â cm and thus slightly above that of modern North Korean men (165Â cm). On the other hand, the average height of modern South Korean men is 172Â cm, 6Â cm more than what we tentatively estimate for pre-modern Korean men. Regression analysis of the height of pre-modern Korean men finds that un-free Koreans (“slaves”) were significantly shorter by about 0.6-0.7Â cm than commoners, whereas the average height of recruits suffering from smallpox did not differ significantly from that of other recruits. Moreover, regional, as opposed to birth-dummy, variables account, and to a significant degree, for most of the differences in height. Whether or not this is a result of socioeconomic differences across provinces or a result of other regionally-varying factors remains an open question.
Journal: Economics & Human Biology - Volume 24, February 2017, Pages 104-110