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| 1107 |
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The Jurchens presented the next threat to Kory , but the latter carried out a preemptive strike. As the Jurchens pressed south, conquering the Khitans (1125) and the Northern Song, great pressure was brought to bear on Kory. Kory leaders decided to accept Jurchen demands for Kory to recognize Jurchen suzerainty over their land, thus avoiding military conflict. Unlike the Khitans and the Jurchen, Kory looked up to Song China and wanted amicable relations. As it was pressured by Khitan and Jurchen forces in turn, Song looked to Kory for military support, but Kory refused. | 1 |
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| 1126 |
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| The first of a series of coups, this one inspired by Yi Cha-gym, erupted among the aristocrats. | 2 |
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| 1170 |
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A coup by military officers deposed  ijong (r. 1164–70), unleashing a quarter-century of chaos at the center. | 3 |
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| 1172 |
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| The first of many popular uprisings erupted, lasting into the early 13th century and indicating that all was not well at the foundations of the Kory social order. | 4 |
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| 1196 |
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| Ch'oe Ch'ung-hn (1149–1219) restored order in the central government through both civil and military dictatorship. Over the next 16 years, he deposed two kings and put four on the Kory throne, all power remaining solidly in his family's hands. He also fought to end independent Buddhist military authority, and succeeded. | 5 |
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| 1231 |
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| The Mongols invaded Kory and met tough fighting. The next year the Kory court was moved off the coast to Kanghwa Island, because it was known that the Mongols feared waterborne assaults. Mongol armies continued their attacks for three decades, and the Kory court remained in hiding. When the Mongols eventually conquered the Jurchens, they looked to Kory as a point from which to launch attacks on the Southern Song and Japan. | 6 |
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| 1234 |
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| Cast-metal type, a form of movable type, was first mentioned in the printing of a Buddhist work. This was probably the earliest use of movable type in the world. | 7 |
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| 1258 |
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| In a move calculated to overturn the powerful Ch'oe clan, civil officials came to a peaceful agreement with the Mongols and real power was returned to the king. | 8 |
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| 1270 |
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| The capital was eventually returned to Kaesng. Through subsequent intermarriage, Kory kings became merely a branch of the Mongol imperial family, their “ènts” in Korea; Kory crown princes characteristically lived in Beijing, effectively as hostages. Kory kings adopted Mongol customs, dress, and names. | 9 |
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| 1274, 1281 |
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| The two Mongol attempts to conquer Japan were both launched with the forced assistance of Kory, and both failed. Kory had to build the ships and provide supplies for the armies. | 10 |
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| 1351–74 |
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| During the reign of King Kongmin, with the Mongols in retreat and their aristocratic supporters discredited, reforms were begun to regularize a scholar-official class of appointees to the bureaucracy, selected on the basis of examinations to test scholarly knowledge. | 11 |
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| 1368 |
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| Cotton seeds were transported to Korea from the Mongol Empire in China, and cotton was subsequently grown for the production of cloth in Korea. | 12 |
| With the accession of the Ming dynasty in China, King Kongmin quickly moved to establish amicable contacts. | 13 |
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