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The distribution of family names and origins in the former half of Chosun was widely different from that of today. There were many family origins in each town and its Imnae, and they were recorded in the item of "Family Names" of such geography books as Sejongsilokjiriji and Donggukyeojiseungnam. Published about 200 years after Donggukyeojiseungnam, Yeojidoseo offers huge gaps in the information obtainable from its item of "Family Names" due to the different recording formats among the areas. The item of "Family Names" for most of the towns in Jeonrado, however, recorded both the family names and origins of the current residents and accordingly allow for a comparison with the period when Donggukyeojiseungnam was published.
Donggukyeojiseungnam and Yeojidoseo were compared for the item of "Family Names" in each town within the perimeter of Jeonrado. The results confirm that "Gaegwan," which was a phenomenon of changing one's family origin, was prevalent across almost all the areas. In Donggukyeojiseungnam, there were total 676 Seonggwans or family names for the family origins in 34 towns of Jeonrado.
Among them, only 55(8.1%) remained in their original towns in Yeojidoseo. While 201(29.7%) of the family names recorded in Donggukyeojiseungnam disappeared in Yeojidoseo, the remaining 420(62.1%) were estimated to have changed the family origins.
There can be many factors that caused the widespread maintenance, omission, or change of family origins between Donggukyeojiseungnam and Yeojidoseo, and the first one was the phenomenon of changing the Seonggwan of Imnae into that of Jueup or another area. Of total 676 Seonggwans, there were more Seonggwans of Imnae at 400 than those of Jueup at 276. However, the number of Imnae Seonggwans that were maintained in Yeojidoseo was 17, which was much smaller than that of Jueup Seonggwans at 38. The percentage of Imnae Seonggwans that were maintained was mere 4.3%. There were many Seonggwans that would disappear or change to other areas both in Jueup and Imnae, but the percentage was relatively higher in Imnae than Jueup.
Furthermore, changing family origins was correlated with the percentage of those who passed the civil service examination to some degree. Of all the Seonggwans that were maintained or changed family origins in Yeojidoseo, around 70% produced successful examinees. The Seonggwans that changed family origins included more "powerful Seonggwans" that produced ten or more successful examinees, which is attributed to the intention of changing into a more powerful Seonggwan when risking the burden of changing family origins.
Those factors continued to work after the Yeojidoseo stage and led to more changes of family origins. Of 54 Seonggwans that failed to produce residents that passed the civil service examination, 33 disappeared from the statistics of 1985.
Among them, the percentage of Seonggwans that disappeared in Imnae was considerably high, and the percentage of Seonggwans that changed to the Seonggwans of other provinces was low. Since they were integrated Seonggwans through the process of "changing family origins," they seem to have secured a competitive edge in other aspects such as population in spite of their failure to produce successful examinees.