Battle of Noryang

Joseon-Ming fleet wins at Noryang as Yi Sun-sin is killed

Yi Sun-sin won the last naval battle of the war but did not live to see its end; he was shot during the dawn pursuit.

Night of the eighteenth into the nineteenth

During the night of the lunar eleventh month's eighteenth to nineteenth days, in December 1598, the combined Joseon-Ming fleet commanded by Yi Sun-sin and Chen Lin fought a Japanese relief fleet in Noryang Strait, between Namhae Island and the Korean mainland.

The Japanese had come to open an escape route for Konishi Yukinaga, blockaded at his Yegyo fortress near Suncheon. Yi and Chen positioned their ships to intercept them in the strait.

The numbers, and how firmly to hold them

The Academy of Korean Studies' source-based account reports roughly 200 Japanese vessels burned, sunk, or damaged and about 100 captured before the remnants fled toward Gwaneumpo. The same account gives about 500 Japanese vessels assembled against about 200 Joseon-Ming.

Those totals are contested. A 2023 Military History Institute study concludes that the size of the Ming contingent remains unresolved, so the figures belong to their sources rather than to the record.

The pursuit at Gwaneumpo

Chasing the retreating ships near Gwaneumpo at dawn, Yi Sun-sin was shot and killed. The traditional record preserves his instruction not to announce his death while the fighting was still urgent.

Modern military-history research places the wound high on the left side of his chest, near the heart, and identifies his flagship captain Song Hui-rip as the officer who held command afterwards. The Ming commander Deng Zilong and several Korean officers were also killed.

Konishi, the man the relief fleet had come for, escaped anyway — sailing south of Namhae Island, bypassing Noryang, and joining the withdrawal through Busan.

Sources

Researched 24 Aug 2026 5 sources not yet audited Date corrected

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Date corrected. The research places this at 1598-12-16.

What the sources leave uncertain

Korean sources date the fighting across the lunar eleventh month's eighteenth and nineteenth days; the standard Gregorian conversion places the climactic action and Yi's death on 16 December 1598.
Fleet sizes and ship-loss totals are disputed. A 2023 Military History Institute study specifically concludes that the Ming contingent's size remains controversial, so traditional totals such as 150, 200, or 500 should be attributed rather than presented as exact measurements.
Details of Yi's final moments come from later official and biographical traditions rather than from Yi's own war diary, which ends before the battle.