Arranged on the high wedding table are some plates of foodsuch as dates and chestnuts as well as a miniature pine tree and abamboo plant in pots. A hen and a rooster are placed underneaththe trees. The food on the table may vary from one region to thenext, but common items are dates and chestnuts, which symbolizewishes for longevity and many children. The evergreen pine treeand resilient bamboo stand for loyalty and fidelity. Though it is themiddle of the day, two candles, blue and red, stand on the table, alsoas symbols of yin and yang. In the past, when weddings were commonlyheld at night, candles were absolutely necessary. But even inmodern wedding halls where dazzling chandeliers hang from theceiling, you will still see these candles on a table. And the weddingsgenerally start with the mothers of the bride and the groom enteringthe hall together and lighting the candles.

Back at Korea House, south of the wedding table chairs are laidout in rows, as at any other wedding. On one side sit the guests ofthe groom and on the other side the guests of the bride. A lot ofother people stand, crowding the yard. Some are standing becausethere are no spare seats and others are foreign tourists, but a largenumber of them have come just to hand in their envelopes containinggifts of cash, greet the bride and groom and their family members,and hurry away before the ceremony ends. While a preferencefor small weddings is growing, most weddings in Korea are still bigevents that many must attend with a cash envelope in hand. That’swhy a wedding invitation in the mail is sometimes considered a billto pay.

Finally, the nice and portly officiant arrives, dressed in a longwhite coat and high black hat, and takes his place on the northernside of the table. In recent times, when a minister or priestdoes not preside over the wedding, this role is performed by one ofthe groom’s former teachers or a friend of the parents, a respectedfigure of good standing in society. But in a traditional wedding,all that was needed was someone to read the order of proceedings,so in most cases an elderly neighbor who could read literaryChinese presided over the ceremony. Today’s officiant is a professionalhost registered with Korea House who sometimes presidesover ssireum (Korean wrestling) competitions. At last, he opens thelarge folding fan on which the order of proceedings is written andsolemnly announces the start of the wedding by saying, “Haengchinyeongnye.” In case the crowd might not understand the archaicSino-Korean , he explains that the groom will now proceedto greet his bride.

Under Confucian tradition, chinyeongnye is the rite in which thegroom goes to fetch his bride and bring her to his home for thewedding. The “Annals of the Joseon Dynasty” from the early periodnotes: “In the traditions of our country, the groom goes to live at thebride’s house and his children and grandchildren grow up in thehome of their maternal relatives,” and “Unlike the Chinese, we donot have the custom of the groom taking the bride back to his familyhome to live. Hence, men regard their wife’s maiden home as theirown and her parents as their own parents, calling them mother andfather.” As Confucian influence grew and took hold in Joseon, Neo-Confucian scholar-officials argued that since man is yang and representsheaven and woman is yin and represents the earth, womenshould obey their husbands and go to live at their husband’s homeafter marriage. That is, the man should not go to his wife’s house tolive when married, but bring his wife to his own parents’ home.

The royal family first led by example, then encouraged the commonpeople to practice chinyeong as well, and send the bride tolive at the groom’s home. Sometimes this marriage custom wasenforced, but with little success because marriage is not only aboutwhere the couple will live. Many other social systems also comeinto play, such as inheritance of assets and the holding of ancestralmemorial rites. Hence a compromise was made and the custom ofban-chinyeong (“half-chinyeong”) was established. That is, the weddingceremony was held at the bride’s home, and after living therefor some time the married couple went to live at the groom’s parentalhome. Indeed, various compromises were suggested. At first theylived at the woman’s maiden home for three years, but it is said thisperiod was later shortened to only three days. The officiant earlierannounced the start of chinyeong, but it seems Korea House hasbeen appointed as the bride’s home for today’s wedding ceremony.

Bride and groom exchange three cups of liquor in the “rite of unifying the cups,”which signifies the union of the two as one.

When the musicians begin to play, the officiant uses the classicalSino-Korean words and modern Korean to announce that “thebridegroom will enter, as well as the goose-father.” The goosefatheris a friend of the groom’s who serves as his attendant carryingthe wooden goose to be presented to the bride’s family as agift in a rite called jeonanrye. The goose is used as a wedding giftbecause it is known to come and go according to the seasons (orthe flow of yin and yang) and to mate for life; thus it is considered asymbol of fidelity.

Before long, the groom’s party enters the yard from behind theopposite building. The groom is dressed in a crimson official’s robeand black scholar’s hat, the uniform of a high-ranking official of theJoseon Dynasty. As Joseon was a Confucian state, the ideal for menwas to pass the state exams and become a government official.So, on their wedding day, even men of the commoner class werepermitted to wear an official’s uniform. Leading the groom are twoyoung boys, one carrying a red lantern and the other a blue lantern.This is a feature that was adapted from the flower girls and pageboys of Western-style weddings.

The officiant calls out the following procedures: “The groom willgo to the bride’s house and lead her to the wedding ... The groomwill go down on his knees and place the goose on the table ... Thegroom will stand up and bow twice.” As before, he speaks the originalSino-Korean words, then gives the modern translation and anexplanation when needed. Next, the groom gives the goose to themother and father of the bride, who are seated inside the hall atthe front, and makes two deep bows. This ends the goose-presentingrite. The groom turns and heads back for the courtyard and,according to the celebrant's instructions, the bride appears frominside. She is dressed in a red skirt and light-green jacket and hasa jeweled coronet on her head.

This wedding costume is a copy ofthe ceremonial dress of upper-class women of the Joseon period.Like the groom, the commoner bride was permitted to wear theseclothes on her wedding day as it was meant to be the most joyousand important day in her life.

Now the wedding party comes down the stairs into the courtyardwith the lantern-carrying boys in front, followed by the groomand then the bride. This procedure, too, is a slight variation on theentry of the groom first and then the bride in a modern wedding.The groom stands on the eastern side of the wedding table and thebride on the western side. They wash their hands as a symbol ofpurifying body and mind, then bow to each other. This rite is calledgyobaerye (“bow exchanging rite”), signifying a promise to spendtheir lives together. While it is not uncommon these days for couplesto get married after the woman gets pregnant or gives birth,in pre-modern times, when marriage was decided between twofamilies rather than the couple concerned, the rite of exchangingbows was when the bride and groom saw each other for the firsttime. The bride, with the help of her attendants, first bows twiceto the groom, who then bows once in return. Once again the bridebows twice and the groom once. Though the celebrant explains thatwoman is yin, which equals even numbers, and man is yang, whichequals odd numbers, it is likely that young female guests wonderedwhy the bride has to bow twice as many times as the groom.

CHANGING MARRIAGE CUSTOMS

For Koreans, marriage used to be the most important occasionin life. The harmony and union of man and woman — of yinand yang — was a part of the shamanic cosmology and worldviewlong before Confucianism. Men and women had to marry;failure to do so was considered a great misfortune. In the agriculturalsociety of Joseon, local officials sought out men and womenwho had not married and found a match for them. If yin and yangare not in harmony and heaven is filled with lingering regrets andgrudges, it was believed the flow of heavenly energy would bedisordered to possibly bring drought and famine. The moderndayinflux of brides from Southeast Asia to marry Korean men inthe countryside who are unable to find wives is not unrelated tothis line of thought. The custom of arranging a spiritual marriagefor young men and women whodie unwed still continues to thisday. One of the tales handeddown from antiquity is that themost fearful ghosts are thespinster ghosts and bachelorghosts who died before theycould marry.

Laid on the wedding table are plates laden with foods such as datesand chestnuts, a miniature pine tree and a bamboo plant symbolizingloyalty and fidelity, and a red candle and a blue candle. Traditionally,a live hen and a rooster wrapped in red and blue cloths, respectively,were placed on low tables underneath the main table, but today replicasare used instead.

Today, however, the proportionof young Koreans who saymarriage is not necessary hasrisen to well over 50 percent;the annual number of marriagesfell below 300,000 in 2016 forthe first time in 40 years. Someargue that economic factorssuch as the impossible cost ofhousing are to blame for youngpeople delaying or even givingup on marriage and the risingmarrying age. The average ageof first marriage rose by fiveyears for both men and womenover the past 15 years. Terms such as “old miss” or “daughterpast the marrying age” have disappeared into the past.

Korean marriage customs underwent great change duringthe Joseon Dynasty when Confucianism was upheld as the governingideology. Then, with the introduction of Christianity in theprocess of the nation’s modernization, the so-called Westernstylewedding became the vogue, but with a celebrant other thanthe minister or priest presiding over the occasion. The weddingvenue also shifted from the bride’s home to a church or weddinghall.

The discussion of the marriage between the two familiesconcerned (uihon) is still carried out, but the wishes andpreferences of the two people concerned have become muchmore important. Even specialized matchmaking companieshave emerged. As the man is yang, no matter what people reallybelieve, the marriage proposal letter and the groom’s four pillars(time, day, month, and year of birth) are sent by the groom’sfamily to the bride’s, a procedure called napchae, and the bride’sfamily sends a letter notifying the groom’s family of the weddingdate, a procedure called yeongil — two customs that continue tothis day, though they are often omitted.

In the nappye procedure, when the groom’s family sends giftsto the bride in a chest, it was customary in the past to send silksor other fabrics for the bride to make her wedding clothes. AmidKorea’s rapid economic growth,however, jewelry such as ringsand necklaces were added tothe chest. Just a decade orso ago, the spectacle of thegroom’s friends going to thebride’s house to “sell the chest”was not an unusual sight. Onefriend served as the “horse”and wore a dried-squid maskon his face and carried thechest on his back while anotherfriend was the “coachman”who directed the horse. Whenthis party of friends neared thebride’s house, they would claimthey could go no further withsuch a heavy chest, whereuponthe bride’s family and friendswould emerge from their housewith food and drink and moneyto give them the energy to puton a spurt and enter the housewith the chest. They would pretend to argue back and forth, oneside refusing to budge and the other side cajoling them to comeinside. Sometimes, the playfulness of the groom’s friends wouldgo a bit too far and voices would be raised.

Moreover, there was an old custom of teasing the groom.When the groom arrived at the bride’s home for the wedding,the young men of the village or young male relatives of the bridewould test his suitability with various tricks and pranks. Originallypracticed on the bride’s side, the teasing of the groom is thesedays often the job of his own friends.

When the bowing ceremony is over, the main part of the weddingbegins: hapgeunrye (“rite of unifying the cups”). The bride andgroom drink three cups of liquor during the ceremony. The celebrantexplains that the first cup represents a vow to heaven andearth, the second cup is a vow of tying the knot, and the third is avow to love each other and stand by each other for life. The cups forthe third vow are made from the two halves of a split gourd; afterthe couple have exchanged their liquor cups and made their vows,the two halves are joined together again. This is meant to showthat the man and the woman are made for each other and that thetwo are now joined as one. Traditionally, the gourd was decoratedwith red and blue threads and hung from the ceiling of the newlywed’sbedroom to keep watch over them. In the course of their livestogether, when the couple had problems they were meant to lookat the gourd and think again. As such, in a traditional Korean wedding,there were no spoken vows or exchange of rings. The brideand groom simply faced each other and bowed, then looked at eachother over cups of liquor. In this way, they quietly promised to spendtheir lives together.

Next, the officiant announces that the newlywed couple will bowto each set of parents and to the guests. This procedure, calledseonghollye, is also borrowed from modern weddings. The officiantthen signals the end of the wedding, advises the couple to loveeach other, raise their children well, be grateful and dutiful to theirparents, and be useful members of society, and lastly thanks theguests for taking time out of their busy lives to witness the wedding.It’s a very short speech in the manner of the celebrant at a modernwedding.

The traditional wedding has come to an end at Korea House, butyet another ritual awaits at most modern wedding halls. In a roomset aside for this purpose, hyeongugorye (“rite of presentation tothe parents-in-law”) takes place. Traditionally, this rite in which thebride formally greeted her in-laws was performed after the firstnight spent at the groom’s family home (in the case of chinyeong) orafter the first three nights spent at the bride's family home (in thecase of ban-chinyeong). But it has been incorporated into the weddingceremony these days.

After the wedding ceremony, the bride and groom face their parentsand guests to bow before them as anof gratitude. Thisceremonial practice comes from modern weddings.

The norms of Korean marriage and family life have been criticizedfor their dominant patriarchal tendency. But changes inrecent times seem to indicate we are going back to the days ofearly Joseon, before Confucian ideology became so strongly rooted.Among newlywed couples, relations with the woman’s family andrelatives seem to be growing stronger than relations with the man’sfamily and relatives. And, as far as the man is concerned, there isincreasingly less distinction made between his own parents and hiswife’s parents when it comes to the rules and customs for funeralrites. In terms of inheritance, legally there is no distinction betweensons and daughters. In modern Korea, it seems the wedding is notso much a solemn rite in which the bride and groom vow to spendtheir lives together, but rather a kind of performance: one event inthe process of marriage that can be freely arranged with new inclusionsand exclusions or reconfigured from scratch.