Hyeok Hweon Kang (Author)
From experimental philosophers in England to workshop managers in Korea, practitioners across the seventeenth-century world developed new ways of investigating nature while studying saltpeter (potassium nitrate), the chief ingredient of gunpowder. Contrary to global histories that emphasize circulation, however, this early modern convergence had less to do with the fluid movement of knowledge and technology than with the very moments when such movement failed. This essay argues that in Chosŏn Korea (1392–1910) the problem of adopting a Chinese method of manufacture—a “thing that did not work”—proved productive in unexpected ways. In the process of vetting the foreign knowledge, the Korean saltpeterers (artisans and military officers) discovered solutions that suited the local conditions. They also established a mode of experimentalism that used hands-on trials to investigate the natural world, drew on the artisanal techniques of “experiment” (sihŏm) and “prototyping” (kyŏnyang), and operated in two languages—the vernacular, hangŭl script and literary Sinitic.
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Book
Cressy, David;
(2013)
Saltpeter: The Mother of Gunpowder
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Article
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(2012)
Le Sueur's Saltpeter Caves at Lake Pepin, Minnesota, and Wilderness Gunpowder Manufacture
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Koo, Mhan Ock;
(2004)
Joseon-hugi Gwahaksasangsa Yeon-gu, 1
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Article
Haileigh Robertson;
(2020)
A gunpowder controversy in the early Royal Society, 1667–70
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Article
Guo, Shi-rong;
(2007)
The Spread of 17th-Century Chinese Translations of Western Mathematical Treatises in Korea
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Bae, Woo-sung;
(2000)
Seogusik Segyejido-ui Joseon-jeok Haeseok, Cheonhado
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Article
Jun, Yong-Hoon;
(2002)
17-18 segi Seoyang-kwahak-ui Do-ip-kwa Galdung - Siheon-nyeok sihaeng-kwa Jeolki-baechi-beope daehan nollaneul Jungsimeuro
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Article
Wung Seok Cha;
(2016)
Managing the Health of Chosŏn Kings: Illness and Treatment in the Daily Records of the Royal Secretariat
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Thesis
Sarah Grandin;
(2021)
To Scale: Manufacturing Grandeur in the Age of Louis XIV
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Article
Bettoni, Barbara;
(2014)
Fashion, Tradition, and Innovation in Button Manufacturing in Early Modern Italy
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Article
Cressy, David;
(2011)
Saltpetre, State Security and Vexation in Early Modern England
(/isis/citation/CBB001200336/)
Article
Yin Xiaodong;
(2008)
Western Cannons in China in the 16th-17th Centuries
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Thesis
Quincy Marie Washa;
(2019)
Philosophical Saltpeter: The Origins and Influence of Gunpowder Technology and the Paracelsian Aerial Niter
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Book
Žmolek, Michael Andrew;
(2013)
Rethinking the Industrial Revolution: Five Centuries of Transition from Agrarian to Industrial Capitalism in England
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Bruno Almeida;
(2018)
Transmitting Nautical and Cosmographical Knowledge in the 16th and 17th Centuries: The Case of Pedro Nunes
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Book
Kamil, Neil;
(2005)
Fortress of the Soul: Violence, Metaphysics, and Material Life in the Huguenots' New World, 1517--1751
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Book
Roberts, Lissa Louise;
Schaffer, Simon;
Dear, Peter Robert;
(2007)
The Mindful Hand: Inquiry and Invention from the Late Renaissance to Early Industrialisation
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Article
O'Brien, Patrick;
(2013)
Historical Foundations for a Global Perspective on the Emergence of a Western European Regime for the Discovery, Development, and Diffusion of Useful and Reliable Knowledge
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Antonio Sánchez Martínez;
(2019)
Artesanos, cartografía e imperio. La producción social de un instrumento náutico en el mundo ibérico, 1500-1650 [Craftsmen, Cartography and Empire. The Social Production of a Nautical Instrument in the Iberian World, 1500-1650]
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Muldrew, Craig;
(2012)
“Th'ancient Distaff” and “Whirling Spindle”: Measuring the Contribution of Spinning to Household Earnings and the National Economy in England, 1550--1770
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