Chapter 3 examines cross-cultural contacts between the Koryŏ dynasty (918–1392) in Korea and the Yuan dynasty (1271–1368) in China and Mongolia (and the broader Mongol Empire), in order to refine our historical context to make clear the kind of Sino-Korean interactions that made the transfer of distilled liquors to Korea possible. As its suzerain state on Koryŏ’s border for nearly 150 years, the Mongols were able to exert considerable influence on Korea. This opened the way to a wide range of cross-cultural interactions, from the stationing of Mongol soldiers on Cheju Island to trade to court relations and intermarriage, situations that created opportunities for the exchange of such things as liquors, concepts of drinking culture, and still technologies, laying the foundations for soju’s development. Such a process is not excusive to alcohol; we see similar patterns in a variety of cultural artifacts (even Korean foods and national dress). Cross-cultural interactions between the Yuan and Koryŏ realms provided Koreans with access to genuinely cosmopolitan societies in Eurasia, so the range of influences went well beyond China or the Mongols. In this way, soju provides an excellent vehicle for understanding both the extent of Eurasian influence on Korea and also Korea’s place in Eurasia under the Pax Mongolica.

Chapter 2 examines the history of alcoholic drinks in Korea from ancient times, and explores Korean sources to ascertain how distilled liquors like soju and arak suddenly appeared when they did in the late Koryŏ period, in the fourteenth century. An overview of the standard literature on the history of soju in the Korean language points the way to solving the key question of soju’s origins in Korea, namely the rise of the Mongol Empire. Thus it becomes important to reconstruct the broader historical context of the Mongol period that facilitated the transfer and rapid rise of soju in Korea. This also opens the door to rich new evidence from recent pioneering efforts in historical, archeological, and anthropological studies that have shed considerable light on discussions of Eurasian distillation transfers generally. Such material not only helps us connect soju’s development to events all over the continent, but also establishes a useful context for comparative analysis. Thanks to these new sources, we are able to revise the standard approaches to the history of distillation technology in Korea in cross-disciplinary ways.